Robert Hoppe - The Governance of Problems Puzzling, Powering and Participation (2010)

the GOVERNANCE
of PROBLEMS
puzzling, powering, and
participation
Robert Hoppe
THE GOVERNANCE OF
PROBLEMS
Puzzling, powering, participation
Robert Hoppe
This edition published in Great Britain in 2010 by
The Policy Press
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I dedicate this book to my father, Frits Hoppe,
who devoted his life to understanding and, where possible,
alleviating the problems of many others.
Contents
List of boxes, figures and tables
About the author
Preface
vii
viii
ix
A problem-processing perspective on governance
Governance of problems
Puzzling and powering
Governance as a quest for political participation and institutional
alignment
Implications for policy analysis
Plan of the book
1
1
7
10
two
The governance of problems: a map
Introduction
Problem structuring and responsive governance
Problems around government
Need for a problem-structuring approach
A conceptual model of the governance of problems
Mapping the governance of problems.
23
23
23
31
42
46
50
three
Analysing policy problems: a problem-structuring approach
Introduction
The politics of meaning
The social and political construction of public problems
On structuring unstructured problems
59
59
59
66
76
four
Cultures of public policy problems
Introduction
Cultural roots of policy problem structuring
What is grid-group cultural theory?
Towards a systematic culturalist theory of problem structuring
Conclusions
91
91
92
94
100
115
five
Problem types and types of policy politics
Introduction
From policy decision making in and between organisations,
to networks
Policy making in and through networks
Summary
121
121
123
one
15
19
130
142
v
The governance of problems
six
Problem-structuring dynamics and meta-governance
145
Introduction
145
Structuring the policy problem: prenatal screening in the Netherlands 146
(1990-2007)
Breakdown of a structured problem: soil pollution in the
150
Volgermeer Polder (1980-81)
From rule to learning, on to bargaining … and back? Drug policy
154
in Swiss cities (1980s-90s)
From unstructured problem to accommodation: protecting the
158
Wadden Sea area’s ecological values (1965-80)
Problem structuring, change in policy politics, and meta-governance
162
seven
Making policy analysis doable and reflexive
Introduction
Still speaking truth to power?
Epistemology: from instrumental to fallibilist-pragmatist rationality
Policy analysis: from analycentrism to the argumentative turn
Towards pragmatic and reflexive policy analysis
167
167
168
171
173
184
eight
The plural democracies of problems: a meta-theory
Introduction
Democracy, frame shifts and network management
Democracies of problems
A meta-theory of democratic practices
195
195
196
198
211
nine
Public engagement and deliberative designs
Introduction
Wrong-problem problems
Shifts in governance: meta-governance
Perplexities of democratic experiments in problem structuring
215
215
215
220
232
ten
Responsible and hopeful governance of problems
Introduction
Propositions on the governance of problems
Asymmetry and polarity between puzzling and powering
Conditions for a responsible and hopeful governance of problems
243
243
243
250
259
Bibliography
Index
vi
263
293
List of boxes, figures and tables
Boxes
2.1
Key terminology used in this book
30
Figures
1.1
1.2
2.1
2.2
2.3
2.4
3.1
3.2
4.1
4.2
5.1
5.2
5.3
5.4
6.1
6.2
6.3
6.4
7.1
8.1
9.1
9.2
9.3
9.4
9.5
Simple typology of problem structures
The governance of problems as puzzling, powering and participation
The decision as an iceberg
Stages and cycle model of the policy-making process
Dunn’s model of a process of integrated policy analysis
Map of mechanisms in problem structuring and a governance of problems
Four types of problem structures
How dominant problem definitions come about and change
Cultural theory’s grid/group typology
Cultural bias and problem framing
From policy decisions to policy networks
Four types of decision rules
Stacey’s use of Thompson and Tuden’s typology as meta-theory for
mapping theoretical developments in organisational decision making
Problem structure typology and types of policy politics
The open issue network, until 2000
The government-designed consultative network, 2001-03
Contemporary closed professional network
Problem-structuring trajectories in the four cases
Styles of doing policy analysis as ‘knots’ of two core policy-analytic
activities
Problem types, political theories and types of democracy
Problem types in healthcare
Four types of gradual institutional transformation
Types of problem structures and corresponding types of citizen
participation
Political judgement as a decomposition and sorting device in learning
about unstructured problems
Simple timeframe model of a mini-public deliberative project
16
17
25
47
47
51
73
79
96
116
124
128
129
142
147
149
150
162
190
211
217
222
226
229
233
Tables
3.1
5.1
6.1
Structured versus unstructured problems
Properties of policy networks relevant to problem structuring
Advocacy coalitions and their belief systems in Swiss drug policy,
1980-2000
77
132
154
vii
The governance of problems
About the author
After affiliations to Radboud University Nijmegen (1972-74), the Free University
Amsterdam (1974-86), the University of Amsterdam (1986-97), and Rutgers
University (1992-93), Robert Hoppe presently is Professor of Knowledge and
Policy at the University of Twente, where he also directs the Public Administration
curriculum and Policy Studies courses for European Studies, Health Sciences and
Civil Engineering, and the Governance of Knowledge and Innovation Graduate
Programme.
Next to articles in journals such as Knowledge & Policy, Science and Public Policy,
Poièsis and Praxis,Administrative Theory & Praxis, Journal of Comparative Policy Analysis,
Organisation & Environment, International Review of Public Administration, Policy &
Politics, Creativity and Innovation Management, Acta Politica, Beleidswetenschap, Beleid
en Maatschappij, Bestuurskunde and Bestuurswetenschappen, his book publications (in
English) include Handling frozen fire. Political culture and risk management (with Aat
Peterse) (Westview Press, Boulder, 1993),Technology assessment through interaction.
A guide (Rathenau Institute, The Hague, 1997), ‘Pollution through traffic and
transport: the praxis of cultural pluralism in parliamentarian technology assessment’
(with John Grin) in Michael Thompson et al (eds) Cultural theory as political science,
Routledge, London,1999), and he is co-editor of Knowledge, power, and participation
in environmental policy analysis (Policy Studies Review Annual,Volume 10,Transaction
Publishers, New Brunswick, 2001), and Working for policy (submitted to Amsterdam
University Press, 2010).
Hoppe’s fields of interest are long-term policy dynamics and innovation,
especially the role of technology; the methodological and institutional implications
of deliberative and participatory policy analysis and technology assessment; the
governance of expertise; and the applications of Q Method.
viii
Preface
The idea for this book emerged gradually. In 1989, in my inaugural address at the
University of Amsterdam, I made the case for a less solution-oriented and relatively
more problem-oriented approach in the discipline of public administration. I
introduced the problem typology, which also organises this book; and on this
basis proposed a more problem-oriented heuristic for policy design by arguing
from problem sensing through problem definition to problem solving.
Two decades and many publications later, these seminal ideas have worked
their way into the discourse, and some of the practice for policy making in the
Dutch public sector. For example, the problem typology and its implications for
practical policy making were spelled out in guidelines for interactive technology
assessment, published in 1997 by the Rathenau Institute (Grin,Van de Graaf and
Hoppe, 1997). Later, the problem types were included as a tool for policy/risk
analysis in the Dutch Institute for Public Health and the Environment (RIVM)
and the (then) Environment and Nature Assessment Agency’s (MNP) (2003) joint
Guidance for uncertainty assessment and communication (van der Sluijs et al, 2003).
More recently, the problem typology and the notion of more problem-oriented
policy making organises and informs the Scientific Council for Government
Policy’s advice entitled Learning government. The case for problem-oriented politics
(Lerende overheid: Een pleidooi voor probleemgerichte politiek) (WRR, 2006).
It was only logical, then, to think that it might be useful to put all my major,
single- as well as co-authored, publications on this theme between the covers of
one book.A research leave grant by the Dutch Organisation for Scientific Research
(NWO) ‘Shifts in Governance’ research programme offered the opportunity to
start writing; a subsequent sabbatical leave granted me the time to finish a first
draft.1 Although the title The governance of problems was in my mind from the very
beginning, only while writing it did it dawn on me that doing the concept full
justice implied much more than just updating earlier publications and writing some
new connecting texts.Thus, from a mere rearrangement of previous publications,
the book evolved into its present shape: a sustained reflection on the Lasswellian
idea of a problem-oriented policy analysis adapted to governance for the 21st
century; and a policy analysis adapted to today’s vastly more complex practices
of boundary work between science, society, policy and politics. Policy analysis
just can no longer pretend to ‘speak truth to power’, yet, more modestly, may still
facilitate policy making as ‘making sense together’.
Thus, new chapters had to be written; and the rearrangement and updating of
earlier work was to become much more encompassing than originally envisioned.
I could never have done and completed this without explicit or tacit dialogues
with many others: former teachers, inspiring peers, examples, opponents, alive or
deceased; and colleagues and students who brought fresh insights, who thought
along with, or resisted, my arguments; and some who had the generosity to read
drafts of chapters and sometimes the whole book. I owe them all a great debt.
ix
The governance of problems
Here I mention only the most important and clearly remembered ones in
alphabetical order: Marjolein van Asselt, Hal Colebatch, William Dunn, Frank
Fischer, John Forester, Henk van de Graaf, John Grin, Willem Halffman, the
late Oscar van Heffen, Matthijs Hisschemöller, Andries Hoogerwerf, Thomas
Hoppe, Margarita Jeliazkova, Toon Kerkhoff, Pieter-Jan Klok, Arno Korsten,
Stefan Kuhlmann, Gijs Kuypers, Anne Loeber, Kris Lulofs, Duncan MacRae Jr,
Aat Peterse, Marty Rein, Jan Rotmans, Arie Rip, Paul Sabatier, the late Donald
Schön, the late Petra Schreurs, Ig Snellen,Arco Timmermans, Michael Thompson,
Arnošt Vesely, Anne Wesselink, Céleste Wilderom and the late Aaron Wildavsky.
Finally, the tangible aspects of book production would not have been realised so
smoothly without the perseverance and other contributions of my editor at The
Policy Press, Emily Watt; and the editorial precision and speed of my secretary,
Evelien Rietberg. I thank them for their humble but essential services.
Rob Hoppe
Enschede
October 2009
Note
Research for this book was financially supported by a research leave grant (number
814-42204) from the Dutch Organisation for Scientific Research (NWO), Social and
Behavioral Sciences Section, the ‘Shifts in Governance’ programme; and a sabbatical
leave from the University of Twente, Faculty of Management and Governance.
1
x
ONE
A problem-processing perspective
on governance
Governance of problems
People as problem processors
People are problem-processing animals. Not that we are all worrywarts, of course.
But people do tend to be concerned about conditions they feel uneasy about.
They brood over situations they experience as uncomfortable or troublesome,
especially if they see no obvious way out. One might call this the substantive logic
of problem processing: experiencing an uncomfortable situation, diagnosing the
nature of the problem and figuring out what to do to solve, or at least, alleviate
the problem. Most problems have a personal character; they concern people as
problem owners, their families, relatives, friends, colleagues, fellow members of
sports clubs and the like. How people solve problems usually remains their own
business.Why bother about others, as long as satisfactory solutions can be figured
out and acted on by yourself and other known people in your own household, or
social circles or communities? But some of these apparently small problems may
come to be seen as problems of larger scope. If your occasional backache turns
out to be a serious threat to your capacity to work and earn a decent income, it
helps to have a public or private health insurance system and a well-organised
healthcare system.
In mobilising assistance in problem processing beyond the scope of family,
household and community, people have access to two such larger systems. One
is the market system, which organises and coordinates assistance through the
transactions between people as buyers and sellers. The other is politics and the
state, which organises and coordinates assistance through the use of multiple forms
of governance that mix voluntary and compulsory forms of mutual adjustment
between citizens, proximate policy makers and political decision makers. This
book focuses on the latter system. But the mere use of the term ‘governance’
implies that the other forms of social coordination are far from neglected. In other
words, next to a substantive logic, problem processing also has an institutional
logic. For us, ordinary people, usually the substantive or provision logic is more
important than the institutional logic. Yet, as will become clear throughout the
rest of this book, the governance of problems at the political level entails that
‘(d)etermining the domain for market, state, family, enterprise, and civil society
1
The governance of problems
… is a serious task for every society, not to be disposed of by all-too-common
dogma’ (Lindblom, 2001: 107).
This is because some problems cannot be seriously tackled without forms of
collective action. This means, for example, that people have to enter politics in
the governance of their personal problems. If speeding cars in front of your house
endanger your children, it helps to mobilise not just the neighbours to help you
wave at cars to lower their speed. At least, you can make them sign a petition to
your local government. Better still, you may enlist support from a local political
party for a speed limit or some physical speed inhibitors or ‘sleeping policemen’
in your street.
People expect responsive governance
Turning to politics or government for help in solving citizens’ problems is
quite a step. For one, they are not sure whether their claims are acknowledged
as serious enough to merit state action. Of course, politics is a competition for
recognition of different problem claims. In one sense, politics provokes antagonism
and competition for recognition of rivalling claims and proposals of responding
to adversity.Yet, once there is some agreement and mutual adjustment of claims
among people, politics also provokes synergy and collaboration:‘[governments] are
instruments for vast tasks of social cooperation’ (Lindblom, 1968: 32; Dauenhauer,
1986: 64-5). In that sense, their help could be of decisive importance.
It is fashionable these days to argue that the pincer movement of privatisation
and globalisation has diminished the powers of government. Indeed, downwards,
through decentralisation, national government has voluntarily ceded power to
local, regional and nongovernmental governance bodies; and, upwards, through
globally increased market interdependencies, it has been forced to share power with
international or transnational governance bodies and multinational corporations.
Therefore, national governments no longer hold an undisputed monopoly as
one-and-only site for defining the common interest. They are no longer the
only site to turn to in the allocation of public values through policy preparation,
implementation and service delivery (Bovens et al, 1995;Anderson, 2003: 4, 104ff).
Yet, in spite of their weakened monopoly, governments are still unique players
in the public domain. The public powers vested in states remain indispensable
resources for collective action for all other ‘partners’ in governance; especially
legitimacy and authority, backed up by all sorts of constitutions, laws, taxation,
and use of coercion through physical force. If people in their capacity as citizens
can harness such state powers in their interests, their scope of collective action
is substantially broadened and enhanced (Bogason, 2000: 5-6, 29ff). This applies
as well to those highly influential citizens who normally decry and protest state
influence most – the entrepreneurs (Lindblom, 1977, 2001). People therefore start
pressing their public problems on governments as legitimate concerns or claims
for public action. After all, they expect their governments and public sectors to
2
A problem-processing perspective on governance
respond to their real collective needs; and do so legitimately, timely, effectively
and in a reasonably efficient way.
To use an expression of former UK Prime Minister Tony Blair, people
expect government to be organised around their problems. The emergence and
institutionalisation of the welfare state and its administrative apparatus, including
the omnipresence of its continuing reforms, is testimony to both the persistence
and the success of this claim. In an influential report entitled Modernising government,
the British government declares:
Modernisation … must be for a purpose: to create better government
to make life better for people … modernisation of government (must)
be a means to achieving better government, better policymaking,
better responsiveness to what people want, better public services.
People want government which meets their needs, which is available
when they need it, and which delivers results for them. People want
effective government, both where it responds directly to their needs,
such as in healthcare, education and social services and where it acts
for society as a whole, such as protecting the environment, promoting
public health and maintaining our prison and immigration services
and defense capability. (Cabinet Office, 1999: para 1.2)
Yet, the straightforward and apparently self-evident expectation of responsive
governance is deeply problematic. One may even claim that the very demand
for ‘organising government around citizens’ problems’ at the same time elicits all
the ‘problems around government’. American political scientist Schattschneider
(1960 [1988]: 134-5, emphasis added), speaking about the US in the 1950s, already
signalled the problem:
People are able to survive in the modern world by learning to
distinguish between what they must know and what they do not need
to know.… Our survival depends on our ability to judge things by
their results and our ability to establish relations of confidence and
responsibility so that we can take advantage of what other people
know.… Democracy is like nearly everything else we do; it is a form of
collaboration of ignorant people and experts. The problem is not how 180
million Aristotles can run a democracy, but how we can organize a
political community of 180 million ordinary people so that it remains
sensitive to their needs.
Democratic politics as governance of problems
Responsive governance appeals to our elementary notion of democratic politics.
The political system is like a chain connecting the needs, desires and political
demands of citizens to public policies that (1) allocate valuable goods, services or
3
The governance of problems
performances in society; and (2) manage to induce most members of society to
accept such allocations as binding (Easton, 1965: 22-24;Thomassen, 1991: 26).The
chain is made up of many intermediary links. Social movements, interest groups
and even journalists interpret and articulate citizens’ worries as issues for public
debate and political decisions. Political parties attempt to reflect such issues in party
platforms designed to attract as many citizens/voters as possible.Voted into power
and supported by majorities of elected politicians in Parliament, governments
take policy decisions; bureaucratic policy staff and science-based experts help
governments translate problems into actionable policies and programmes, ready
for implementation in the networks of public, nongovernmental and private
organisations responsible for the delivery of goods, services and performances
to citizens.
Responsive democratic governance vitally depends on practices of debate,
interrogation and dialogue. In democratic politics, the ruled or citizens as ‘distant’
policy makers have definite rights and possibilities to question the rulers or
proximate policy makers and political authorities.Vice versa, rulers have rights, but
also privileges and plenty of opportunities to influence the questions posed by the
ruled. They open up debate around certain questions or keep such problems off
the agenda. Similarly, they open up debate around particular answers as problem
solutions or close down such debates. Governance of problems is not only about
problems or topics to be discussed; it also concerns quality controls and the
allowance or disallowance of information, procedural and competence rules for
who can and cannot participate in the question-and-answer game. In short, rulers
and ruled in interaction and political struggle implicitly or explicitly decide on
who, on behalf of whom, may question/answer what, when and how. Rulers and
ruled make use of an ‘ensemble’ of institutions, beliefs, practices and rules around
the question-and-answer game of democratic politics. Jointly, I propose to call
their engagement with this ensemble, the way it is used by rulers and ruled, the
governance of problems.
The system is democratic and responsive if a majority of citizens feels satisfied
with the problem-processing chain’s final link – policy outputs. Or, if they are
not happy, at least they can live with them as legitimate outputs of the questionand-answer process. But satisfaction and legitimacy are far from self-evident,
for two reasons. First, from a cognitive or rational point of view, questioning or
problem finding, posing the right questions, does not nearly get the attention
devoted to providing the right answers, or problem solving. (This is the major
theme of Chapter Two.) Second, from the point of view of a political division of
labour, the cognitive rift between answering and questioning is exacerbated by the
inevitable cleavage between rulers and ruled.The intermediaries between citizens
as questioners and public authorities or decision makers as answer-givers are not
neutral messengers. They inevitably frame citizen needs and demands according
to interests, frames of reference, and role conceptions of their own. (This is the
major theme of Chapters Three and Four.)
4
A problem-processing perspective on governance
Jointly these two reasons give rise to the possibility, if not the frequent experience
and common expectation, of a structural mismatch between problem perception
and definition by larger segments of the citizenry and their proximate policy
makers and administrators. Perhaps worse, democratic governance systems may lose
viability due to insufficient attention to quality maintenance of the question-andanswer game between rulers and ruled. (This will be more extensively argued in
Chapter Two.) There are many examples: the US government’s false ‘intelligence’
about weapons of mass destruction in Iraq as a pretext to sending troops into
the Middle-East; the Australian government’s equally untrue election story about
children thrown overboard by asylum seekers to force a naval ship to rescue them
and thereby enter Australia; the Dutch electorate’s failure until very recently to
force their government to give reasons for involvement in the Iraq war; let alone
the public’s own role in the financial and economic crisis since 2007.With Nick
Turnbull one may observe:
[O]ur problem today is perhaps that there is not enough questioning.
This applies to all sides of policy debates…. In many cases, political
elites continue to suppress questioning, direct it in ways that serve
entrenched interests, or dissuade others from introducing new
problems. And while policy regimes have failed to respond to some
public demands, the public itself continues to look the other way in
the face of important questions. (Turnbull, 2005: 222; also 389, note 59)
The need for more reflexive1 problem structuring
The threat of a structural mismatch between problem finding and problem solving
in our governance systems should be taken seriously. It may lead to an infarct of
the question-and-answer game, which is the heart of democratic governance. Many
examples will be adduced in the rest of this book. Its major thesis and message is
that in order to maintain a sufficiently responsive system for the governance of
problems, contemporary democracies ought to develop more reflexive institutions
and practices of substantive, or policy-oriented and institutional, or polity- or,
more broadly, governance-oriented problem structuring. Problem structuring
refers to the search, debate, evaluation and political struggle about competing
problem representations and framings. Problem structuring, whether as analytic
or political process, is an intermediary but vital step on the way to authoritative
policy problem definition and political choice of policy designs. Citizens have
come to dislike the imposition of the welfare-cum-administrative state’s wellordered, but professionally and bureaucratically pre-structured problem frames and
top-down rule, however effective and efficient in their own terms. They rather
want their governments to develop the skills and institutions to prudently and
democratically transform their experiences of problematic situations and their
ways of framing problem representations in truly intersubjective but authoritative
public definitions of policy problems. Simultaneously, citizens ought to become
5
The governance of problems
better, more critical questioners themselves (Lindblom, 1990; Turnbull, 2005).
Better governance implies political sensitivity to different types of problems; and more and
better reflexive problem structuring through better institutional, interactive and deliberative
designs for public debate and political choice.
Approach
This book takes a multidisciplinary, interdisciplinary and conceptual as well as
pragmatic approach. It is multidisciplinary in that it approaches its subject – problem
processing in governance systems – from a political science (powering, participation),
a policy analytic (puzzling) and a generic social science (governance) perspective.
It is interdisciplinary in that puzzling, powering and participation are consistently
analysed from a unifying social-constructivist perspective on problem structuring
in political task environments. This brings together and organises many insights
from political science, public administration, the sociology of problems, decision
sciences, organisation studies and policy studies in novel ways. Particularly for policy
studies and policy analysis, the governance of problems approach is a necessary
update and revitalisation of the discipline’s problem orientation (also Turnbull,
2005). Proposed as the hallmark of policy analysis in an age of high modernism
by Lerner and Lasswell in the 1950s (Lerner and Lasswell, 1951), a problemoriented policy analysis badly needs redefinition for 21st-century governance.
The governance of problems approach transcends the traditional stages- or phasemodel; and adds new dynamics as well as the idea of meta-governance to the
widely accepted network models of policy making. (This is the topic of Chapters
Six and Nine.) The governance of problems approach avoids the high expectations
of (social) science as problem solver par excellence so typical for policy analysis and
policy science under the high modernism of the 1950s and 1960s. Under the
21st-century conditions of a Mode-2, or post-normal, science, the relationship
between policy and science has changed, too. (This topic is addressed in Chapter
Seven.) The governance of problems approach to policy analysis is pragmatic in
that it shows how major conceptual and theoretical issues can be applied to the
pragmatics of policy design and to the running of experiments in mini-public
deliberative policy analysis (in Chapter Nine). The idea that political life can be
studied as a strategic undertaking around the governance of problems, as problem
framing and solving, also picks up (in Chapters Five, Eight and Ten) the original
themes of empirical decision-making theory, that is, how to take better account
of the small brain/complex environment situation, the relation between puzzling
(cognition) and powering (interaction), and how to better exploit the intelligence
of democracy for policy-oriented and social learning.
This introduction to the governance of problems as the topic of this book
is, of course, just a set of preliminary statements and judgments, which needs
persuasiveness through evidence and argument. Providing these will be my task
in the other chapters. The rest of this chapter is devoted to explicating some key
6
A problem-processing perspective on governance
assumptions and concepts underlying the structure of my argument. At the end
of the chapter, the plan of the book is set out.
Puzzling and powering
Man as ‘homo respondens’ and politics as puzzling
One may not expect to understand politics and governance without any
understanding of individual man. Hence, an author should explicate his image
of man (Moon, 1975: 192). This is all the more important where in the social
sciences rational choice has become the dominant perspective; and even where
claims of comprehensive rationality are rejected in favour of bounded rationality,
the image of man is limited to cognitive or rational aspects. Instead of reducing
the image of man to variations of ‘homo cogitans’, we need more holistic images
of man, which include, for example, emotions, sociality, and attitude to the human
condition as such.
I believe that the best short expression of the nature of man in this broader
sense is to be found in the philosophical anthropology of an international cast of
(political) philosophers like Karl Jaspers, Hannah Arendt, Maurice Merleau-Ponty,
Paul Ricoeur, Bertrand de Jouvenel, Peter Sederberg and Bernhard Dauenhauer.
They would all typify man as a speaker, as living in and through discourse, first;
but, given that, foremost as ‘homo respondens’. Let me quote German philosopher
Karl Jaspers (1981: 55):
Among all life forms only man is aware of his finitude. As undefinitive
and imperfectable being (‘Unvollendbarkeit’) this finitude means more
than a mere awareness of his condition. Man has a sense of loss, from
which spring both a moral duty and a possibility. Man finds himself
in a completely hopeless situation, but in such a way that, through his
freedom, there is the strongest possible appeal to (self)development
(‘Aufschwung’). [translation by RH]
Awareness of his own finitude condemns man to freedom, as it were. Having been
thrown into this life, man is forced to find an answer to the exigencies, challenges
and possibilities of the human condition. But his freedom in choice of answer
simultaneously constitutes his responsibility. Each answer, however personal and
unique, goes beyond his individual self as act with consequences for the Other –
be it the objective Other of things in the world, or the subjective Other of fellow
human beings.Thus, man is free; but it is a freedom-in-responsibility.That is why
man is a ‘homo respondens’: free to answer, but also answerable to the objective
and subjective Other (also Dauenhauer, 1986: 80).
In this image of man, politics comes naturally to human beings. It is the social
space where man’s words and deeds are shared, and where his actions gain durability
and responsibility by being remembered (Arendt, 1958: 177). In the political
7
The governance of problems
sphere, man gives accounts of his thinking and acting; he becomes accountable to
others, answers their questions about his acts, and thereby discovers and continually
shapes and reshapes his own identity. In this precise sense, politics is grounded in
questioning and answering:
Political activity is responsible precisely to the extent that it fosters
and maintains an open dialectic among men. … man’s speaking, and
indeed his entire way of being, is interrogatory. (Dauenhauer, 1986: 43)
As I will argue in Chapter Two, to the extent that policy making is a political
activity, it is a dialectical and interrogative process of making sense and giving
meaning to the adversities and opportunities in the situation of a political
collectivity.
Man as unity-in-disharmony and politics as powering
On the one hand, man is a respondent; on the other, he is also unity-in-disharmony.
Jaspers (1960: 147) expresses the idea in the following way:
Man is always more than he knows of himself. He is not what he is
at a particular juncture in time or what he aims for; he is ‘en route’....
That is why man is essentially a broken creature. Whatever he thinks
about himself, in thinking he contrasts himself to himself and others.
Everything appears to him as difference. This is equally true when
he distinguishes between his being and his appearance, between his
thinking and his acting, or between his actions and his intentions.…
The decisive fact is that man is forced to contrast himself to others and
other things. Being human means being torn between opposites. But
he cannot remain in this alienated state. How he conquers his internal
disharmony is what makes him as a person. [translation by RH]
Being unity-in-disharmony is what condemns man to be a problem processor.
After all, problems are disharmonies that people try to conquer – disharmonies in
his own experience of a discomforting present and images of more desirable future
conditions; disharmonies between his problems and those of others; disharmonies
between his ways of solving problems and those of others. The disharmony
penetrates politics and policy making as the struggle over truly ‘wicked’ problems.
Political and policy-making processes are fraught with conflicting interests,
radically divergent problem framings, competing alternative problem solutions,
and highly uncertain outcomes. Problems are ‘wicked’ ‘in a meaning akin to that
of “malignant” (in contrast to “benign”) or “vicious” (like a circle) or “tricky”
(like a leprechaun) or “aggressive”(like a lion, in contrast to the docility of a lamb)’
(Rittel and Webber, 1973: 160). They are ‘wicked’ because:
8
A problem-processing perspective on governance
[T]he problems that planners must deal with are … incorrigible ones,
for they defy efforts to delineate their boundaries and to identify
their causes, and thus to expose their problematic nature.The planner
who works with open systems is caught up in the ambiguity of their
causal webs. Moreover, his would-be solutions are confounded by a
still further set of dilemmas posed by the growing pluralism of the
contemporary publics, whose valuations of his proposals are judged
against an array of different and contradicting scales. (Rittel and
Webber, 1973: 167)
‘Domesticating’ wicked problems means structuring them, by leaving out
of consideration certain aspects or dimensions of the problem as originally
manifesting itself. It means that ‘wicked’ problems are never solved in the sense
of satisfactorily dealing with and meeting every term of the problem. In ‘wicked’
problems some terms are only partially met; some not at all. That is why wicked
problems can only be settled, never solved.And because they are only settled, some
people sooner or later may want to open debate or re-engage in contestation
about the unsolved or only partially solved problem parts. This makes wicked
problems returning ‘monsters’ for politics and policy making.
The disharmony even penetrates to the image of politics itself. Politics’ beautiful
face is puzzling on collective’s behalf. Yet, it does not always manifest itself as
peaceful dialogue, debate and mutual consultation about essentially shared
projects in some idyllic city-state or ‘polis’. Politics has its ugly face, too. It is
about powering; a contest of contradictory wills and visions, a race for power
and influence; it may stop short of outright violence, but legitimate and not-solegitimate use of instigation and coercion is all in the political game. In analysing
politics and policy making as governance of problems, the tension between
puzzling and powering, between reason and will, between argumentation and
instigation is a major theme. Reason tries to find discursive closure in debates over
policy problems on the sole basis of the strength of the best argument; therefore,
it grants science and scientific policy analysis a strong voice in the governance
of problems. In contrast, political will strives for nondiscursive closure, either
through amicable or forcible instigation, that is,‘sparking off contributory actions’
(De Jouvenel, 1963: 8), or through the complicated arithmetic of interests and
volitions in voting and negotiation, or through the use of legal authority and
legitimate coercion. In the governance of problems as powering, ruling proximate
and authoritative policy makers use problem framings and definitions to mobilise
political support. Science and policy analysis deliver the argumentative ammunition
for them and their political opponents.
Puzzling and powering, then, are different, even diverging logics in the
governance of problems.The distinction is an important theme in the composition
of the book. Chapters Four through Six discuss how policy makers use the
governance of problems to define the scope and composition of policy networks
as the political theatre or arena for policy making. Also, they create a division of
9
The governance of problems
labour between audience and players, and a cast of different sorts of players with
differential powers and competencies.
Chapters Two and Three are devoted to policy analysis as puzzling. Chapter
Seven is about scientific epistemologies’ influence on academic policy analysis; and
its contrast to policy analysis doable in the world of politics and administration.
The governance of problems, though, has a third pillar next to puzzling and
powering. One cannot puzzle or power without participation in the game of
question-and-answer that is policy making.
Governance as a quest for political participation and
institutional alignment
Just a fashion-word?
‘Governance’ is the fashion-word in politics and the social sciences. Its etymological
roots date back to the Greek verb kubernein (in at least the beginning of the first
millennium BC): steering a vessel or chariot. Plato was the first to use it in a
metaphorical sense for the steering or government of people. From the Greek,
the verb found its way into Latin, and from there to French, English, Spanish and
Portuguese as a generic label for ‘government of people’. Thus, it is perhaps the
oldest and most generic word for any activity or process of deliberately using
power in order to coordinate sizeable groups of people’s performances to bring
about desirable aggregate results and avoidance of risk and undesirable outcomes.2
Thus, strictly speaking,‘governance’ designates almost any effort to deliberately
influence one group of people on behalf of some other group. One may
legitimately wonder what analytical purchase there is in turning to such a
hypergeneric concept. The answer is that in the course of history, ‘governance’
acquired specific, time, place and actor bound connotations that were decisive for
its use or disuse:‘Governance is constructed by the questions asked’ (Rhodes, 2000:
67). For example, in some of the countries mentioned, the term lost popularity in
the 17th to 18th centuries because it was tainted too much by the Anciens Régimes
of absolute monarchy.‘Governing’, for the process or activity, or ‘government’, for
the institutions or set of political and administrative apparatus of the state, became
the almost universally preferred term in the 19th century and most of the 20th
century.Yet, in the 1990s, ‘governance’ was to make a glorious and international
comeback. So, if ‘governance’ was the answer, what were the questions?
State penetration of life-worlds
‘Governance’ once was dismissed because of its too close links with an oppressive
absolute monarchy. Paradoxically, in our days the rejection of ‘government’ in
favour of ‘governance’ is to be found in questions about the overwhelming power
of the modern state. In his The history of government, Sam Finer observes how only
during the past two centuries of its 5,200 years of known history, government
10
A problem-processing perspective on governance
became unremittingly intrusive into the homes, occupations and daily lives of
citizens (Finer, 1999: 1624, 1610-11). Extension of the franchise and the partition
of the state into three more or less independent but overlapping legislative, judicial
and executive powers did nothing to hamper the growth of government’s ability
to act directly, by its own agents, upon the population and its behaviour through
surveillance, control and direction. Jürgen Habermas (1981) analysed the power
of the state as one important manifestation of the colonisation of the citizen’s lifeworld. Even when in the age of welfarism (in domestic politics) and development
aid (abroad) the political intention was to improve the human condition, states
increased their central control, imposed their own standards on citizens’ lives and,
generally, tried to make the lives of citizens as legible and transparent as possible
to state surveillance (Scott, 1998). Anthony Giddens (1985: 309, emphasis added),
too, observes:
Administrative power now increasingly enters into the minutiae of
daily life and the most intimate of personal actions and relationships.
… the possibilities of accumulating information relevant to the
practice of government are almost endless. Control of information …
can be directly integrated with the supervision of conduct in such a
way as to produce a high concentration of state power. Surveillance
is a necessary condition of the administration of states, whatever end
this power be turned to. It is not only connected with polyarchy but
more specifically with the actualization of citizen rights. The provision
of welfare cannot be organized or funded unless there is a close and detailed
monitoring of the life of the population, regardless of whether they are actually
welfare recipients or not….
So, the first question that drives the quest for ‘governance’ is the state’s intrusiveness.
This question has a logical counterpart: is a ‘state-less’ society possible?
Retreat to the market, and the idea of a self-regulatory society
Where ever-increasing state discipline was questioned, the freedom and autonomy
of citizens were celebrated as ideals. All the more so since a democratic state
was said to emerge from some sort of ‘social contract’ between free citizens,
which in the form of a state would subsequently further the interests of citizens
as free and emancipated individuals. Politically, this idea was operationalised as
the ever-widening expansion of the franchise, eventually effected through mass
political parties. For the rest, the idea of the state as springing from a ‘social pact’
was pretty silent about how such a state would operate after the conclusion of
the pact. Literally, the king as embodied ‘head of state’ was replaced by an idea,
the artificial political construct of popular sovereignty, embodied in the elected
members of a representative Parliament (legislative power). And because the
Parliament was supposed to somehow represent all citizens, and the executive
11
The governance of problems
was controlled by Parliament, Parliaments were believed to express a unified,
‘general will’ of the people, as a kind of deus ex machina of democracy. In other
words, democratic governments governed over a body of citizens constructed to
be a unified, abstract and generalised mass:‘Generality can lead to a representation
of society as a unified will because it is based on the possibility of abstracting
from particular man’ (Rosanvallon, 2006: 222).The only weak constraint on this
generalised and abstract ruling was the judiciary branch. It was equally concerned
with a generalisable idea of citizenship in designing a system of civil rights
applicable to any individual citizen without exception.Yet, within this framework
of generalisable legal constraints, it sometimes forced the state to take into account
some particularities and differences between individual citizens – primarily in
terms of property rights.
From the perspective of production and consumption of goods and services,
the same idea of free and emancipated people appeared to be embodied in the
emergence and fierce expansion of the market system as separate institutional
domain for the coordination of the particular needs of individual men, however
different among themselves.As convincingly argued by Pierre Rosanvallon (2006:
147-59), the political advocates of the free market system immediately attacked
the social contract foundation of the state. Economic liberalism pictured the
market system as politically superior to all other forms of social coordination.
It constructed the market system as the ideal of the autonomy of individuals by
depersonalising the social relationship; it is the archetype of an anti-hierarchical
society, in which relations of passion, kin, violence or power no longer play a
decisive role:
The price system is the mechanism that fulfils this task [self-interested
action that makes everyone better off, RH] without central direction,
without requiring people to speak to one another or to like one another.…
Economic order can emerge as the unintended consequence of the
actions of many people, each seeking his self interest.The price system
works so well, so efficiently, that we are not aware of it most of the time
(Friedman, quoted in Rosanvallon, 2006: 151-2, emphasis added)
In precisely this sense, economic liberalism gives expression to a profound
aspiration of civil society as opposed to the state: the ideal of an entirely selfregulated or self-guided society.
In reality, of course, the market system was not just an inclusionary movement
for all people as voluntary sellers and buyers. Rapid introduction of the market
system in fact created the sharp social cleavage between the masses of the
industrial proletariat and entrepreneurial or capitalist elite, ruling the masses in
their corporations, characterised by Lindblom (2001) as ‘islands of command in a
sea of market’. This led, first, to the emergence of stronger and stronger workers’
protective associations and political parties. Their ideal became the replacement
of capitalism by socialism. The Marxist ideal of unhampered individual self12
A problem-processing perspective on governance
development and the withering away of the state, that is, the harmonious anarchy
of communism as a substitution of the reign of men with the administration of
things, clearly is the second historically important expression of the idea of a
self-guiding society. So strong became this ideal, and this is the second historical
development of importance, that during the First World War in Russia, and after
the Second World War in large parts of Central and Eastern Europe, and in China
and other parts of South-East Asia, states were founded that were devoted to the
realisation of communism. Except for China, since the demise ‘real socialist’ states
in the 1980s, we know that this experiment failed, leading some to declare the
ultimate victory of the market system. In 2009, with a rampant crisis of financial
capitalism spilling over to what is called the ‘real economy’, and in the face of an
imminent ecological crisis, it is equally clear that the market system’s superiority
was announced too soon. This leads to a third set of questions making for the
revival of ‘governance’.
‘Governance’ as a response to complexity, variety and the threat of
fragmentation
No doubt, a third theme in the revival of ‘governance’ is the sheer complexity and
variety or fragmentation in governing a hypercomplex society facing economic
and ecological crises. After the Second World War, at least in the nation states of
Western Europe, and to a less extent the US, Canada, Australia and New Zealand,
a different experiment took place: designing a welfare state that balanced workers’
protection against the benefits of capitalism.After some five decades of experience,
the result is a highly complex, variegated and intertwined system of ‘governance’.
The institutional orders of households, corporations, markets, civil society and
the state appear to criss-cross each other in chaotic, hardly understandable but
troublesome ways.
The power of corporations has grown to the extent that almost everybody now
acknowledges that the privileged position of business interests in the political
system downgrades its claim to be democratic; but this is accepted as the price
for making the market system work as the generator of wealth for many people
in these societies (Lindblom, 2001: 249). Under welfarism, the state has become a
vast administrative apparatus, where the executive – and no longer Parliament – is
the main source of social regulation or policy making; and with lots of delegated
powers and competencies to non-elected bureaucrats (as the ‘fourth branch’ of
government), in their turn assisted and advised by lots of equally non-elected
experts (as the ‘fifth branch’).
Globalising markets have nevertheless nibbled away at the sovereignty of states
to regulate their societies. The European Union in Europe, but also worldwide
international regulatory bodies like the International Monetary Fund and the
World Bank, to mention just these, are constraints on the sovereignty of states.
Simultaneously, numerous governance arrangements, from well-known corporatist
forms to more recent practices like negotiated rule-making with many civil society
13
The governance of problems
associations and organisations, also restrict state sovereignty. Pierre Rosanvallon
(2006: 193-4) observes:
[T]he growth of the self-organizing capacity of civil society stands out
as the truly remarkable phenomenon.A complex system of interests and
wills substituted for the former ideal type of the political will, a model
that presupposes a unified actor.…The regulations did not disappear,
but they lost their comprehensive scope and, above all, their legibility.
Society has not stopped ‘willing’, but it has come to express its wishes
in muted tones…. Civil society indeed has a ‘politics’, but a discreet
and silent one, the result of a multitude of deliberations in low voices
and discreet choices that are never openly tallied.
Thus, in debates on ‘governance’ the bewildering variety of ways in which
governing occurs is a major theme.The focus is on the differential set of authorities,
different from case to case, which seek to make people’s behaviour governable; the
very diverse strategies, technologies and instruments of governmentality that they
use; and the conflicts between them and the way these conflicts are played out
(Rose, 1990: 21). Historically, this process from government towards governance
may be summarily sketched as a process away from hierarchy and elitism; moving
towards more and more inclusive forms of individual interest-driven and social
or solidarity-driven participation in social coordination.
If it is, nevertheless, useful to find a broadbrush, holistic term for designating
change in these heterogeneous and potentially rivalling modes of mutual
adjustment and deliberate coordination of human activities for collective purpose,
‘governance’ (in keeping with its etymological roots) can be defined as a hypercomplex
socio-cybernetic system (Kooiman, quoted in Pierre, 2000: 252):
In contrast to the state or the market, socio-political governance is directed at
the creation of patterns of interaction in which political and traditional hierarchical
governing and social self-organisation are complementary, in which responsibility
and accountability for interventions are spread over public and private actors.
In other words, governance is about efforts to align or bring about concerted action
across multiple, competing institutional modes of social coordination for public purpose
(O’Toole, 2000: 278).
In a governance approach to policy making, two quests are visible and join each
other. The first quest is for institutional alignment. It is a complementarity not
predefined through ideology or policy paradigms. Rather, it is a complementarity
discovered in and through policy practice, in social and policy-oriented
experimental and learning processes (Helderman, 2007: 103-4; 254). In Chapters
Two, Six and Nine, this thought will be elaborated in notions like institutional
entrepreneurship, venue creation and interpolable balancing as institutional
‘tinkering’ from within the context of existing opportunities and constraints.
The second quest is about civic engagement or political participation by ordinary
citizens and functionaries. Inspired by Charles Lindblom, another adherent of the
14
A problem-processing perspective on governance
self-guiding society (Lindblom, 1990: 213-30), the turn to governance may be
considered the intellectual reflection of a general trend towards problem-specific,
practical arrangements for social and political decision making as improved
‘probing’. Improved probing means the continuous process of involving more
citizens and lay persons or non-authorities and non-professionals in societal
guidance. It means reaching beyond the state, the market and science as standing
institutional arrangements for societal probing. Institutionally, governance
means the mixing of different institutional arrangements (like state, markets,
civil society and science) for the delegated probing of people’s volitions in more
optimal participatory and deliberative shapes or spaces of democratic governance.
Ultimately, it rests on the recognition that wants, needs or preferences are webs
of socially and politically created and recreated, never just ‘discovered’, volitions.
The issue is: who participates in this creation of volitions? Thus, the question
of governance strongly implies the question: who participates in governance? In
Chapters Four, Nine and Ten, questions of participation will figure prominently.
Implications for policy analysis
Governance of problems means problem structuring
Taking my cues from philosophical anthropological assumptions about the nature
of man, I have depicted politics and policy making as puzzling and powering
in efforts to domesticate problems of social coordination; problems that are, in
principle, always ‘wicked’. Domesticating a wicked problem means structuring it
in such a way that it becomes fit for (partial) solutions, or settlements. I have also
argued that such efforts may be fruitfully analysed as political question-and-answer
games that require different modes of the governance of problems. Reflection on
the meaning of governance in political and social science debates revealed deepseated worries about institutional alignment among very different, potentially
competing and clashing, but practically entwined modes of social coordination.
This is an issue that ultimately boils down to questions of who participates, how
elites control masses and, vice versa, how masses control elites.
In order to show the implications of a governance of problems and problemstructuring perspective for policy analysis, we need a conceptual map that contains
‘problem structure’ as a core variable. After all, it is imperative to show who poses
what kinds of questions in policy discourse; and who came up with what kinds
of answers; and how this question-and-answer process, this dialogue between
problem finding and problem solving, moved policy debate on (or not) towards
an authoritatively structured problem, as a basis for further efforts in policy
design and implementation. In fact, it means a reconsideration of the Lasswellian
problem orientation to policy analysis in terms of a primacy of problem finding
over problem solving in policy debates. As I will show in Chapter Two, all too
frequently the priority is the other way round (see Turnbull, 2005: 131). Another
advantage of this approach is to escape from the limits of ‘adjectival’ policy analysis,
15
The governance of problems
that is, policy analysis that starts from subject areas or policy domains as usually
labelled in the media or by government officials. Policy analysts should not let
political or media authorities define problems for them. Rather, policy analysts
ought to find the standard for their own work in its relevancy for the governance
of problems in public debate.They should begin by respecting the many problem
frames, definitions and structures aired in public debate by all those who care
to participate; and not give priority to those of some subset of actors, however
politically important.
To that end, a well-known typology of problem structures will be the core
variable of a map of the governance of problems. Anticipating the detailed
argument in Chapters Two, Three and Four, a simple definition of a problem
says that it is a deviation between an existing state (‘is’) and a desirable one
(‘ought’). The ‘is’ is represented in the stock of available and relevant knowledge
that can be used in understanding the problem; especially in moving away from
the problematic situation, perhaps but not necessarily towards the more desirable
situation. There can be more or less certainty on this stock of knowledge. The
‘ought’ is represented in the set of norms, values, principles, ideals and interests
at stake in defining the problem. There can be more or less ambivalence or
ambiguity of normative issues at stake. Crossing the certainty of knowledge and
the ambivalence of values dimensions, one gets a simple fourfold typology of
problem structures as in Figure 1.1.
Figure: 1.1 Simple typology of problem structures
Far from
certainty on
required and
available
knowledge
Unstructured
problems
Moderately
structured problems
Moderately
structured problems
Structured
problems
Close to
certainty ...
Far from
agreement ...
Close to agreement on
norms and values at stake
The simple point is that participants in policy debates, especially proximate policy
makers and authoritative decision makers, try to steer public debates in any of
these four directions; and thereby create quite different political task fields for
themselves and others. People discussing a structured problem’s technicalities
and the efficiency of finetuning means to context or each other will have a
very different kind of debate than those discussing unstructured, ‘wicked’ policy
16
A problem-processing perspective on governance
problems in open networks with fluid participation of multiple players. Moderately
structured problems with shared principles and goals lead to debate on the set
of means; particularly about their effectiveness in view of foreseeable outcomes
on agreed evaluation dimensions. But how to handle debate on unstructured or
wicked problems where lack of knowledge makes it impossible to foresee which
course of action will generate which outcomes; and where evaluation standards
are so ambiguous and/or contested that it is impossible to reason in terms of a
shared or general interest? The claim of this book essentially is that, depending on
policy players’ preferences, selection of problem structure triggers implicit selective
affinities with a number of other dimensions of the political task field, namely
affinity with citizens’ cultures (Chapter Four), policy network type (Chapters
Five and Six), style of doing policy analysis (Chapter Seven), type of democracy
(Chapter Eight) and type of political participation by citizens and other policy
players (Chapter Nine).
Puzzling, powering and participation
These selective affinities show up once the governance of problems is studied
from the three different perspectives of puzzling, powering and participation. In
a highly simplified, first-cut model (to be explained, elaborated and refined later),
the argument is depicted in Figure 1.2.
Figure 1.2:The governance of problems as puzzling, powering and participation
Critical
junctures in
POWERING
Networks of
(not-so-)
proximate
policy players
Practices of
argumentation
and instigation
(non-)
decision
Dominant
problem
structure
Critical
junctures in
PARTICIPATION
Problem
frames in
good currency
Critical
junctures in
PUZZLING
First, problem structure depends on puzzling or analysis as cognitive support for
authoritative policy choice (Colebatch, 2006b: 319) on behalf of the collective
(Heclo, 1974: 305); that is, on how well founded or convincing the problem
17
The governance of problems
claims are, and a judgement as to whether government really is in a position to
make a difference. Returning to the case of backaches used in the very beginning
of this chapter, scores of medical specialists, health insurance economists, policy
analysts at the Department of Health, and perhaps some experts in occupational
health and safety working for a trade union or nationwide patient platforms,
have already performed a lot of puzzle work. Based on rules of evidence-based
medicine, they have established what sorts of backaches are treatable; and decided
which treatments deserve coverage in health insurance plans. Their puzzling or
policy-analytic work may have as an outcome a state policy that does not cover
your particular sort of backache; thus, you should pay for medical assistance out
of your own pocket.
Problem structure depends, second, on powering; that is, on sufficient pressure
and influence mobilised for a problem claim in the political process of aggregation,
priority setting and choice among the many demands on the state’s problemsolving capacity. Problem structuring also is about the power differentials between
the variety of players in a particular policy network; players that have to be
instigated into cooperative, collective action through persuasion and partisan
analysis, or not-so-benign political tactics and strategies of mutual adjustment.
Suppose you really are convinced that your type of backache should be covered
by health insurance, for example because it is shared by a majority or sizeable
minority of all backache sufferers. You might try to establish local and national
interest groups of fellow backache patients and organise a lobby. Since your political
lobby work will create only a weak signal and its problem claims are likely to be
construed as the self-interested whining of work-shy employees, you seek allies
with political clout and credibility. There may be reputed medical professionals
willing to back up your complaints as real and treatable; or influential employers’
associations in support of insurance coverage, because additional costs, even in
the shape of placebo treatment, are more than compensated for in gains of Gross
Domestic Product and tax revenues due to the expected reductions in sick leave.
After some more intense lobby work directed at strategically selected Members
of Parliament (MPs), the political support of these influential players may well
result in putting the issue back on the agenda of the Department of Health.
Third, problem structure depends on participation; that is, on who is included
or excluded from having a voice in the puzzling; and whose resources and
connections create what weight and influence in the powering. It is clear that welldeveloped policy-analytic skills and an audible voice in puzzling, and sufficient
clout and diplomatic skills in powering, largely depend on participation. After all,
decisions are made by those who show up. Only recognised medical expertise
makes your backache problem a topic in consultations on coverage between
health department officials and health insurance economists. Only well-targeted
informal lobbying and permanent presence and visibility in public debate may
guarantee that your problem is part of the political negotiations potentially leading
to concrete policy proposals. Participation, puzzling and powering are three
interdependent conditions in the governance of problems, with participation as
18
A problem-processing perspective on governance
the central, but also potentially wobbly, pillar. This is because participation may
not only decisively influence puzzling and powering, it may also be influenced
by problem structure (as explained in Chapters Three and Five).
Plan of the book
To repeat, the major thesis of this book is that contemporary democracies, in
order to maintain a sufficiently responsive system for the governance of problems,
ought to develop more reflexive institutions and practices of policy-oriented and
polity-oriented problem structuring. A structural mismatch between problem
perception and structuring by larger segments, if not a majority, of the citizenry
and their proximate policy makers, is a real possibility; and thus a threat. Equally
threatening is the risk that the entire question-and-answer game between rulers
and ruled at the heart of democratic governance comes to a standstill. Citizens have
come to dislike the imposition of a government’s well-ordered, but professionally
and bureaucratically pre-structured, problem frames and top-down rule, no matter
how effective and efficient in their own terms.They rather want their governments
to develop the skills and institutions to prudently and democratically transform
citizens’ experiences of problematic situations, and their ways of framing problem
representations, in truly intersubjective but authoritative public definitions of
policy problems. Better governance implies political sensitivity to different types
of problems; and more and better reflexive problem structuring through better
institutional, interactive and deliberative designs for public debate and political
choice. This message will be fleshed out in the rest of the book.
Chapter Two,‘The governance of problems: a map’, serves a number of functions.
First, it defines key concepts and conceptual distinctions used throughout the
book. Second, it underlines the theoretical, political and societal relevance of the
distinction between problem finding and problem solving. Finally, it formulates
the specific research questions to be answered, and the conceptual model of the
governance of problems that organises the book.
In Chapter Three,‘Analysing policy problems: a problem-structuring approach’,
I address the socio-cognitive aspects of problem structuring in defining political
environments or task fields from the viewpoint of policy players. From this
perspective, I show it to be useful to distinguish between four types of problem
structures: structured, unstructured and two types of moderately structured
problems (see Figure 1.1, above).
In Chapter Four, ‘Cultures of public policy problems’, the politico-cognitive
aspects of problem structuring are embedded in their cultural-institutional ecology
and dynamics. I show how each of the four problem structures has strong selective
affinities or congruencies with only one type of cultural-institutional environment:
hierarchy, individualism, groupism or enclavism, and isolationism or fatalism.
In Chapter Five, ‘Problem types and types of policy politics’, I move one step
closer to policy practice by showing how policy constrains the politics of policy
making in different types of policy networks: rule in closed professional networks,
19
The governance of problems
negotiation-and-search in oligopolistic networks with two or more competing
advocacy coalitions, accommodation in designed networks of strong ethical
and worldview antagonism, and learning and/or agonistic politics in open issue
networks. This chapter may be read as a sustained reflection on and amendment
of Lowi’s thesis that policy determines politics.
In Chapter Six,‘Problem-structuring dynamics and meta-governance’, the types
of policy networks and policy politics distinguished in the previous chapter are
illustrated through case examples. It is shown that types of problem structures
and policy politics change through time.Therefore, using concepts like policy or
institutional entrepreneurship, and meta-governance, I show that policy players
actually have some leverage in shaping policy networks and problem structures.
Narrowing the perspective to the puzzle aspect of problem framing and
structuring, Chapter Seven,‘Making policy analysis doable and reflexive’, addresses
the historical development of policy analysis. It shows how policy analysis had
to radically revise its epistemological and methodological assumptions. From
decision support to leaders and their top-level staff or ‘speaking truth to power’,
policy analysis had to revamp itself as ‘making sense together’. Meanwhile, leaving
epistemological differences aside, in practice several doable styles of policy analysis
have developed. The chapter ends with an overview of doable styles in policy
analysis as instruments for reflexive practitioners.
Chapters Eight and Nine address the macro-level question of how to move
the political system as a whole towards a more reflexive level of the governance
of problems. Chapter Eight, ‘The plural democracies of problems: a metatheory’, exploits and elaborates the notion of the intelligence of democracy
by showing how each of the problem structures has selective affinities with
different, but standard, theories of political democracy: Schumpeterian procedural
democracy, liberal-pluralist democracy, accommodationist elite-cartel democracy
and deliberative and/or participatory democracy. The day-by-day practice of
democracy requires us to tinker with different modes of democratic governance
to successfully deal with different problem structures. Chapter Nine, ‘Public
engagement and deliberative designs’, focuses on shifts in governance as gently
nudging the governance system towards more deliberative and participatory modes
of problem structuring. The notion of meta-governance, introduced in Chapter
Six, is elaborated as deliberate interpolable balancing through the alignment and
transformation of institutions in policy networks. The chapter also analyses and
evaluates modes of civic engagement and discusses the challenges and possibilities
of running experiments in mini-public deliberative policy analysis.
But one should not turn a blind eye to the ironies of the inevitable and
perennial tension between instigation or powering, and deliberation as a mode
of puzzling. Therefore, Chapter Ten, ‘Responsible and hopeful governance of
problems’, discusses how such tensions can be managed, instead of slipping into
non-negotiable contradictions. I advocate a governance of problems as fruitful
oscillation and alternation between puzzling and powering.This requires politicians
to foster a politics of responsibility, reflexiveness and hope, which believes in the
20
A problem-processing perspective on governance
correction of powering by prudential puzzling; and the approximation of the
regulative ideal of a self-guiding society through participation of more and more
people in the question-and-answer game of democratic governance.
Notes
It is important to point out that, following common contemporary social science
parlance, I use the term ‘reflexive’ to mean ‘conscious’, ‘intended’ or ‘controlled’. Think
of looking at yourself in a mirror. It usually refers to self-critical reflection on one’s
behaviour, leading to learning and sometimes real change. This is the exact opposite of
everyday usage of ‘reflexive’ in the meaning of ‘reflex-like’, ‘automatic’, ‘uncontrolled’ or
not self-conscious.Think of the knee reflex. In everyday parlance social science ‘reflexivity’
would be ‘reflectiveness’.
1
Although there is a clear overlap between ‘governance’ as a concept in politics and the
social sciences and ‘cybernetics’ as an interdisciplinary academic field, to my knowledge
there is no direct theoretical link, in the sense that ‘governance’-thinkers heavily or
exclusively draw on the body of knowledge of ‘cybernetics’ as a scientific discipline.
The most recent definition of cybernetics actually narrows ‘governance’ to instrumental
rationality in goal-directed, efficient behaviour ‘to understand and define the functions
and processes of systems that have goals, and that participate in circular, causal chains
that move from action to sensing to comparison with desired goal, and again to action.
Studies in cybernetics provide a means for examining the design and function of any
system, including social systems such as business management and organizational learning,
including for the purpose of making them more efficient and effective’ (Wikipedia, consulted
16 January 2009). Instead, governance theorising frequently uses notions derived from
complexity and chaos theory.
2
21
TWO
The governance of problems: a map
Government organised around problems, not problems around
Government. (Tony Blair, speech on civil service reform, 24 February,
2004)
Introduction
Much has already been written on responsive governance. This book brings
together issues that are traditionally treated separately: the analysis of problems
(puzzling), the politics of problem framing and network management (powering)
and the politics of political participation.The conceptual ‘umbrella’ to be used for
integrating these different themes is problem structuring. It is a powerful analytic
concept, which manages to integrate a lot of political and policy science insights
in an easily grasped way.
First, this chapter deals conceptually with the question: what is problem
structuring? Second, using the development of the welfare state and, particularly,
the events of ‘Paris 1968’ as historical illustrations, it will show the political
relevance of problem structuring. The question underlying this part is: what do
we know about how much influence citizens do actually exert on the structuring
of public policy problems? The chapter ends with the articulation of research
questions dealt with in the rest of the book; and with a conceptual map of the
governance of problems, which explains the organisation of the book.
Problem structuring and responsive governance1
Problem finding versus problem solving
What do I mean by problem structuring? First, problem structuring refers to the
cognitive, puzzle aspect of processes of problematisation in politics and public
policy. It emerges from an experience and reflection on the practical tension
between problem finding and problem solving.2 Very generally, a problem is a gap
between a current situation and a more desirable future one. Problem processing is
usually considered to be about problem solving. It means that people start looking
for ways of bridging or diminishing the gap between an ‘is’ and an ‘ought’. Problem
solving assumes that people have consent on values at stake and have identified
policy ends; thus, they can afford to focus attention on finding the most effective
and efficient means. By applying those means, they develop expertise, a division
of labour, collaboration, organisation and other coordination mechanisms. In
23
The governance of problems
short, problem-solving efforts usually start a process of institutionalisation around
the shared problem; a social recognition that there exists a set of organisations
that provide a ‘permanent’ solution to a ‘permanent’ problem of a collectivity
(Berger and Luckmann, 1967: 69-70); one may also speak of politics as ‘issue
machines’ (Braybrooke, 1974: ix) that result in the collective normalisation of a
problem. One speaks, for example, about ‘housing policy’, or ‘healthcare policy’
or ‘criminal youth policy’:
It is as though there were a political gateway through which all issues
pass. Disputed from the moment they are in sight of it – and more
hotly as they approach – they pass (if they pass) through, and drop
out of controversy for a time. Managing the procession are certain
‘gatekeepers’ – not just the Cabinet of the day, but bureaucrats,
journalists, association heads and independent specialists camped
permanently around each source of problems. To talk of a political
process is to recognize some hint of a pattern in the way in many
different fields the controversial is transformed into routine. (Davies,
quoted in Colebatch, 2005: 15)
Clearly, to the extent that a government has already been organised around
problems, it is the result of institutionalised problem-solving practices. Along
with the set of policy players involved, the problem frame and definition itself
gets stabilised and fixed.
However, what is often neglected is that problem processing actually starts
from problem finding: ‘governing depends on the identification of situations
as problems, the recognition of expertise in relation to these problems and
the discovery of “technologies” of governing which are seen as an appropriate
response’ (Colebatch, 2006b:313; also 2002b: 431-2). In a philosophical or
‘problematological’ redemption of questioning-about-questions as the basis of
thought, politics, democracy and policy making, Turnbull (2005: 96) argues that:
[T]he problem solving concept shifts the focus from debating the
meaning of the problem to confirming the solution.… In fact, defining
politics as dissolution of problems leads to authoritarianism because it
condemns the agency of human beings and is consistent with attacks
on the rights of citizens to ask questions. Going back to the origins
of Western philosophy, Plato’s authoritarianism resulted from his own
rejection of Socrates’ questioning method in favor of an essentialism
that eliminated the problematic a priori. (Turnbull, 2005: 91)
William Dunn (2007: 53, emphasis added), too, has pointed out that next to the
instrumental rationality of problem solving there is in policy analysis another,
more foundational form of rationality:
24
The governance of problems: a map
Erotetic rationality refers to a process of questioning and answering.…
In many of the most important cases, analysts simply do not know
the relationships between policies, policy outcomes and the values in
terms of which those outcomes should be assessed. Here, the frank
acknowledgement of ignorance is a prerequisite of engaging in a
process of questioning and answering, a process that yields rationally
optimal answers to questions that ‘transcend accreted experience and
outrun the reach of knowledge already at our disposal.’ (Rescher, 1980:
6). Erotetic rationality is closely related to problem structuring as the
central guidance system of policy analysis.
In contrast to problem solving, then, problem finding presupposes openness to new
information on facts and values, so that policy ends may be either reconsidered
or newly formed; an activity that may entail a new search for alternative means.
Problem finding resists institutionalisation of problem solving – at least, overly
strict forms of organisation around fixed problems. Nevertheless, in both practice
and theory, solving problems attracts more attention than problem finding. Hence,
a problem often is presented as an objective given. Finding problems is hardly
considered an issue in itself. Political theory and political struggle alike focus
more on alternative solutions than the nature and content of the problem itself.
Chisholm (1995: 472) has convincingly argued that political struggle and political
theory both pay attention only to the tip of the iceberg and ignore what is below
the water surface (see Figure 2.1).
Figure 2.1:The decision as an iceberg
Selecting an alternative
Generating alternative(s)
Surface of the sea
Representing the problem
Signalling the problem
Source: Adapted from Chisholm (1995: 472)
25
The governance of problems
Problem-solving bias in politics and administration
The focus on solutions rather than problem identification and representation is well
documented. Leo Klinkers (2002: 23), former professor of public administration
and later policy consultant, concludes from ample experience:
[C]ivil servants are weak in analysis. They rather start working on
solutions immediately, and corrupt quality thinking by falling in the
trap of solution-thinking. Analysis costs too much time …, thinking
hard hurts your brain, and especially your heart, because a lot of issues
emerge that you would rather leave in the dark and not-discussed.
Efforts at analysis are frequently smothered in the slogan ‘We should
not get lost in doomsday scenarios’. Or, equally damning: ‘There are
a lot of successes too, aren’t there?’ [translation RH]
At best, governments tend to be ambivalent about investing in problem-finding
capacity. They have great difficulty in refocusing capacity building for better
governance from problem solving to problem finding. The UK government,
in its White Paper entitled Modernising government (Cabinet Office, 1999: para
2.3) admits that the ‘emphasis on management reforms [= problem solving,
RH] has brought improved productivity, better value for money and in many
cases better quality services… On the other hand, little attention was paid to
the policy process and the way it affects government’s ability to meet the needs
of people.’ Yet, the same White Paper devotes but little attention to devising
new policy-making procedures and institutions to improve government’s ability
for problem analysis and responsive problem structuring. Instead, its focus is on
professionalising policy making through special purpose organisations for socalled ‘joined-up’ policy making around allegedly shared political goals and the
government’s overall strategic purpose (Cabinet Office, 1999: para 2.7).The issue
of responsive governance is in fact ‘downsized’ to better-managed, more flexible
policy implementation as service delivery (Cabinet Office, 1999: chapter 3).
As another example of the practice of governmental policy making, consider
Boom and Metze’s (1997) report entitled De slag om de Betuweroute (The battle
over the Betuwe-line).The Betuwe-line Project in the Netherlands was concerned
with the problem of keeping an expanding Rotterdam harbour well connected
to the rest of Europe. The project started, not with a thorough problem analysis,
but with how one potential solution, a new trajectory for a freight-only railway
between Rotterdam and the German border, could be squeezed into the densely
populated and river-rich Dutch landscape. Nobody thought about alternative
means of freight transportation until too late in the political decision-making
process. Solution-focused policy design is far from a Dutch peculiarity, though.
Consider, for example, Flyvbjerg’s (1998: 11ff) Rationality and power. Flyvbjerg
meticulously describes how the Aalborg Project in Jutland, Denmark, aspired to
integrate environmental and social concerns in inner-city planning, including
26
The governance of problems: a map
how to deal with car mobility. But the project started out from and stuck to the
solution of creating a supersized bus terminal right in the middle of the historical
city centre.
The concept of problem structuring
Both problem finding and problem solving are indispensable moments in highquality policy making. However, countering the normal tendency, in this book
I will stress problem finding. Problem structuring is the connecting or overarching
concept necessary for a balanced view of problem processing as the ‘whole iceberg’
of both problem finding and problem solving. In moving from inchoate signs of
stress on the system to one or more solvable policy problems, policy analysts and
other ‘puzzlers’ normally
face a large, tangled network of competing problem formulations
that are dynamic, socially constructed, and distributed throughout the
policy-making process. In effect, analysts are faced with a meta-problem
– a problem-of-problems that is ill-structured because the domain of
problem representations held by stakeholders is unmanageably large.
(Dunn, 2007: 83)
Problem structuring, then, is about the search and evaluation – with a view
to potential integration – of competing problem representations. It produces
information on what problem(s) to solve (Dunn, 2007: 6).
This implies that the ‘puzzler’ takes an active part in the problem-structuring
process; consciously or not, he imposes structure on tangled problematic situations
and multiple problem representations or framings. Seen from a puzzling perspective,
problem setting or problem finding, therefore, is a creative process (Turnbull, 2005:
103). Interpretive frames provide the link between worrisome clues experienced
or observed in a situation, and the later clear articulation and formulation of
the problem. ‘Frames’ are interpretive schemas or groups of ideas or ‘paradigms’,
which generate broad attitudes and orientations towards a problematic situation.
They highlight certain worries over others, select out irrelevant ones and bind
the remaining concerns in a coherent pattern. The key to understanding frames
is to see them as questioning processes ‘that structure the world by delimiting the
field of possible answers’ (Turnbull, 2005: 102).
This is more than just a technical argument in a methodology of policy analysis
as cognitive activity. Bridging problem finding and problem solving through
problem structuring inevitably also is an ‘essentially political activity to produce
new insights on what the problem is about’ (Hisschemöller and Hoppe, 2001:
51). Problem framing is part of the way citizens, intermediaries between citizens
and decision makers, and public authorities in government allocate attention
and prioritise problems on the public, the political and the decision-making and
implementation agenda; all in the context of the practical workings of democracy
27
The governance of problems
in a given polity.Therefore, the politics of problem framing implies several modes
of political interaction, involving such roles as citizens, representatives of economic
and non-commercial interest groups and associations, party leaders, politicians
elected in Parliaments, administrative functionaries and experts. This means that
both problem framing and problem solving are related to the exercise of power.
Problem framing may be the less publicly visible part of problem processing.
However, to the extent that the opaque choice of a problem frame actually
triggers the inclusion of some and exclusion of other alternatives, it is of equal
political importance:
Political conflict is not like an intercollegiate debate in which
opponents agree in advance on the definition of the issues.As a matter
of fact, the definition of alternatives is the supreme instrument of
power.… He who determines what politics is about runs the country,
because the definition of alternatives is the choice of conflicts, and the
choice of conflicts allocates power. (Schattschneider, 1960 [1988]: 66)
Problem structuring and participation
If the two moments in problem processing are part of powering in politics, the
analysis and politics of problem finding and framing is inextricably tied to a politics
of participation:‘Whoever decides what the game is about decides also who can get
into the game’ (Schattschneider, 1960 [1988]: 102). Immediately the issue is raised
of the citizen’s role vis-à-vis other political players in political arenas: what is the
citizen’s proper role in problem structuring as an essential part of policy making
as problem processing? Usually, citizens are cast in the role of ‘distant’, sometimes
informed and monitorial (Schudson, 1998), but mostly ignorant policy makers.
Other players, like interest group representatives, advice-giving experts, policyadvising and implementing civil servants, and politicians, are seen as ‘naturally’
involved, more ‘proximate’ policy makers. My analysis will focus on the dangerous
tensions between political participation in problem structuring by citizens and
more proximate policy makers (see also Dery, 2000).
In standard political theory, longstanding views on the capacity for informed,
rational political judgement by the average voter or typical citizen are rather
pessimistic. Such pessimism flows from two sources. Some, most famously
Schumpeter (1942), are convinced that ‘ordinary’ citizens just lack the skills
for responsible political judgement. Alternatively, others, like Schattschneider
(1960 [1988]) and Lindblom (1968), believe that in our hypercomplex societies,
citizens have no choice but to outsource political judgement to specialists that
can spend all their working hours as more ‘proximate’ policy makers. Therefore,
many politicians, administrators and political scientists still believe that ordinary
citizens are to be kept out of policy making as much as possible.
In political and administrative practice, however, the ‘old’, modernist politics
of traditional government through representative democracy, the welfare-cum28
The governance of problems: a map
administrative state and the scientific estate is more and more contested. It is
complemented, if not claimed to be replaced, by a ‘new’, postmodern politics
that promises to tap societal needs and knowledge better, and improve both the
input and the delivery end of policy making through social- and policy-oriented
learning. It is widely believed that this may be achieved through more political
involvement or giving more voice to civil society or ordinary citizens compared
to proximate policy makers and other experts. This is not only true for nation
states; it applies to international and transnational governance structures as well.
The 2001 White Paper on European governance (European Union, 2001: 11, 12,
14-15, 33, [emphasis in original]) states:
Making the Union operate more openly: Democracy depends on people
being able to take part in public debate.To do this, they must have access
to reliable information on European issues and be able to scrutinize
the policy process in its various stages.… Reaching out to citizens through
regional and local democracy: … The process of EU-policymaking …
should allow Member States to listen and learn from regional and local
experiences.… Involving civil society: Civil society plays an important
role in giving voice to the concerns of citizens and delivering services
that meet people’s needs.… It (provides) a chance to get citizens
more actively involved in achieving the Union’s objectives and to
offer them a structured channel for feedback, criticism and protest.…
Build public confidence in the way policy makers use expert advice:The EU’s
multidisciplinary expert system will be opened up to greater public
scrutiny and debate.… It must boost confidence in the way expert
advice influences policy decisions.
In other words, wider political participation and empowerment of citizens is
back in the public debate and public agendas of many countries.Yet, it remains
ambiguous as to what extent a ‘reinvented’ politics actually allows more citizen
involvement or empowerment through participatory or deliberative or other
new forms of democracy.
Summary
In this section, I have outlined the approach that permeates this book. It is a
problem-processing view of governance, or the governance of problems. Technically,
it uses some key conceptual distinctions that have been listed in Box 2.1 for the
reader’s convenience. I have stressed the process of problem structuring as vital
for a responsive governance of problems.The importance of problem structuring
was discovered and originates in the study of how policy analysts cognitively
move from inchoate signs of problematic situations, through the unravelling of
multiple stakeholders’ problem representations, to doable, solvable problems for
public policy. I have also explained why problem structuring is not just an issue
29
The governance of problems
in the epistemology and methodology of policy analysis, but is also inextricably
tied into issues of political power games and participation.Thus, puzzling, powering
and participation are indispensable moments in public problem processing. They
are usually dealt with in separate parts of the literature. The basic question of a
problem-structuring approach to the governance of problems is: by taking a
problem-structuring perspective, what may we learn about the possibilities and
impossibilities, the enabling and constraining driving forces behind responsive
democratic governance in our technologically, socially and economically
hypercomplex societies?
Box 2.1: Key terminology used in this book:
Problem
Problems are experienced as non-acceptable discrepancies between real situations and desired
future situations; between a socially constructed ‘is’ and ‘ought’. However, from a political
as well as cognitive point of view, they vary in terms of degree of consent on relevant, valid
knowledge on what is and will or can be; as well as in terms of degree of consent on values,
norms and standards at stake in defining a desirable future situation. This insight is the basis
for a fundamental typology of different kinds of public problems: structured, unstructured
and two types of moderately structured problems (see Chapters One and Three).
Problem processing
Refers to all cognitive and non-cognitive, explicit or tacit, social or individual, political or
non-political activities, especially all sorts of claims people make on other people, to do
something about a ‘problem’; the concept includes all the other concepts listed in this box.
Problem finding (problem sensing, problem identification)
Refers to claims that some set of conditions in the real or virtual future world ought to be
considered a ‘problem’, that is, ought to be seen by others as an undesirable situation, as
compared to some conception or other of a more desirable, future situation.
Problem framing (problem representation, problem categorisation)
Refers to different, frequently contradictory or clashing ways of representing or categorising
conditions found to be ‘problematic’ by citizens, stakeholders and other, more proximate policy
makers in finding and identifying a particular problem. ‘Frames’ are interpretive schemas or
groups of ideas or ‘paradigms’, which generate broad attitudes and orientations towards a
problematic situation. They highlight certain worries over others, select out irrelevant ones,
and bind the remaining concerns in a coherent pattern. For example, drug use can be framed
as a public order or as a public health problem.
Problem structuring (analytically: problem diagnosis)
Refers to the search, debate, evaluation and political struggle about competing problem
representations or framings. Problem structuring, whether as an analytic or a political process,
30
The governance of problems: a map
is a necessary intermediate step on the way to problem definition or authoritative choice in
policy designs. Problem structuring may aim at some ‘integration’ of different problem frames
or representations, with a view to creating feasible, doable problems for public modes of
governance. Formally, problem structuring is defined as the self-conscious search, analysis and
evaluation of competing problem representations and problem framings, with a view to their
possible integration. In a more political twist, one could also define problem structuring as the
political activity to produce information on divergent views of what the problem is about, with
a view to a synthetic, or at least politically plausible, choice of authoritative problem definition.
Problem definition (problem choice)
Refers to an authoritative problem definition as the temporarily fixed outcome of processes
of problem finding, framing and structuring; always a cognitive-cum-political selection or
choice from a larger set of politically or intellectually mobilised problem framings, expressed
in formal policy designs.
Problem solving
A concept referring to all that people may or can do to actually bridge the formally
acknowledged or taken-for-granted gap between current undesirable and future, desirable
situations; problem solving means finding, elaborating and selecting alternative courses of
action for successful goal achievement, that is, to diminish or actually eliminate the gap.
Problems around government
The horns of the dilemma
The need for a problem-structuring approach may be argued from the claim
implied by Tony Blair’s aphorism: that we should and can have a ‘government
organised around (citizens’) problems’, without all the ‘problems around
Government’ that have become manifest since, roughly, the 1970s.
But what if the very ways in which governments have been organised around
citizens’ problems generate all the problems around government? What if we are
dealing with a real dilemma? After all, in the final decades of the last century,
politics, the welfare state and public policies were repainted in public opinion,
the news industry and even by politicians themselves, from a problem solver to
a major cause of problems for citizens. In terms of economic science, market
failures to be corrected by states have been far superseded in priority by an urgent
sense of across-the-board government failure. Many have diagnosed a crisis of
state legitimacy, or a serious rupture, a yawning ‘abyss’ between the state and its
citizens, to be remedied only by a ‘new’ politics.
In Dutch politics, nothing illustrates the shift from an ‘old’ to a ‘new’ politics
better than the last weeks of August 2001. On 30 August 2001, Prime Minister
Wim Kok (Labor), respected leader of an almost eight-year-old ‘purple’ coalition
31
The governance of problems
government by Labour (PvdA), conservative liberals (VVD) and progressive liberals
(D’66), announced his decision not to run for office again, and to end his political
career. Nine days before, Pim Fortuyn, the flamboyant, populist enfant terrible of
Dutch politics, and charismatic proponent of a ‘new’ politics in a more ‘livable
Holland’, announced his decision to establish a new political party. His political
platform was a constant accusation of Dutch democracy as ruled by elites that
co-opt each other but neglect authentic citizen interests:
Due to this lack of democratic quality, we, citizens, have been saddled
with a public sector increasingly emptied from its original intention,
i.e. the delivery to citizens and firms of services perfectly reflecting
their needs. On the contrary, services delivered frequently do not
correspond to any needs, or show poor to abominable quality. (Fortuyn,
2002: 12) [translation RH]
A masterful media performer, Fortuyn charmed almost the entire electorate by
ending his first campaign speech with the military salute: ‘At your service!’.
Fortuyn was shot on 6 May 2002.That same evening only prudent police action
nipped public rioting in the immediate surroundings of the Dutch Parliament and
the Prime Minister’s department in the bud (De Vries and Van der Lubben, 2005:
22-31). In the polls the hastily established political party,‘Lijst Pim Fortuyn’ (LPF),
was predicted to enter a 150-seat Parliament with a landslide 36 seats. Electoral
campaigns for all political parties came to a halt. In the national elections of 15
May 2002, the LPF won 23 seats; subsequently, joining Christian Democrats
(CDA) and Conservative Liberals (VVD), the LPF became the third party in
a new centre-right coalition Cabinet. Since then, Fortuyn’s political party has
turned out to be a dismal failure, although not without profound influence on the
issues of public debate, the platforms and agendas of most Dutch political parties,
and Cabinet decision making. Beyond doubt, Fortuyn demonstrated the possibility
and political threat of gross mismatches between problem perception and framing among
large segments of the electorate, and those of a political and administrative elite in power,
unchallenged for too long (De Vries and Van der Lubben, 2005; Keman, 2008: 150).
For all Fortuyn’s claims to incarnate a ‘new’ politics, his ‘At your service!’
merely repeats politics’ and the welfare state’s most important claim to legitimacy.
Politicians, in return for being voted into power over the welfare state apparatus,
promise to use that power to solve public problems put on the agenda by citizens.
Public policies are supposed to be rational answers to public problems. However,
often the contrary is true; Fortuyn himself magisterially exploited that theme –
problems do not decrease, but intensify; they do not vanish, but turn out to be
complex and persistent.This is not just due to some citizens’ behaviours creating
problems for other citizens; higher-level governments generate problems for
lower-level governments, and vice versa.
Referring to the US context of the 1990s, Schneider and Ingram (1997: 5) also
note that policy failure has become a sort of to-be-expected, ‘normal accident’:
32
The governance of problems: a map
The policy design problems are not the normal product of a rapidly
changing world that will be met by reasonable collective solutions.
Instead, they have taken on the character of long-term policy failures.
Rather than provide institutions and symbols to ensure that the selfcorrecting mechanisms of pluralist democracy will be operative, the
policies deceive, confuse, and in other ways discourage active citizenship,
minimize the possibilities of self-corrections, and perpetuate and
exacerbate the very tendencies that produced dysfunctional public
policies in the first place.
In other words, governments create as many problems or more than they pretend
to solve; and this is not accidental, but systemic failure. Was Milton Friedman
right that government solutions are usually as bad as or worse than the problem
itself? Why?
The welfare state: intended solutions and unintended problems
Contemporary welfare states, in their manifold manifestations in Europe, the
US and Canada, are products of the later phases of modernity (Wagner, 1994).
Modernity is social-science shorthand for the historical project to inscribe and
translate the principles of Enlightenment and individual freedom into society’s
social, economic, political and cultural practices. This modernisation process has
become increasingly riddled with conflicts and crises rooted in dilemmas between
autonomy and discipline. Dreams of rationality and individual autonomy have
clashed with the realities of their unavoidable boundaries, the practical constraints
of increased interdependencies in time and space between people (Elias, 1991),
and the realities of an ever-more penetrative state bent on standardisation, central
control and making society legible to the centre (Scott, 1998).
A first protracted crisis of modernity is the period from 1848 until around
1900. By the turn of the 18th into the 19th century, the permeation of society by
modern legal and economic institutions had increased considerably. Large parts of
the population were disembedded, often traumatically, from their Gemeinschaft-like
life-worlds and thrown into larger systems and processes of Vergesellschaftung. Mid19th century, this entailed a strong sense of loss of intelligibility and manageability
of modernising societies among political and administrative elites. Simultaneously,
at least in Europe, there was a first wave of moderate social security legislation and
measures to mitigate for workers the risks of industrial labour. Scholars such as
Marx,Tönnies,Weber and Durkheim developed their grands critiques of modernity.
Especially the rationalisation of industry and state bureaucracy were analysed as a
double-edged process of enlarging and speeding up the modernity project, while
simultaneously disciplining, instead of liberating, individuals.
From 1900 until roughly the beginning of the Second World War, social scientists
observe an increasing formalisation, conventionalisation and homogenisation
of practices in the institutionalised, semi-autonomous spheres of the economy,
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The governance of problems
politics and science. In economics, new boundaries were set on permissible
activities: building of technical-organisational systems on a society-wide scale,
conventionalisation of work practices and standardisation of consumption. In
politics, the mass party and its channelled political participation emerged. Also,
the beginnings of the welfare and administrative state were discernible, as well as
disciplining methods extending into family life. Finally, we see the blossoming
of the modern conception of the natural sciences and technology as a basis for
military and industrial complexes; and the social sciences as new conventionalised
modes of representation of social realities and as decision aids.
From the end of the Second World War until ‘1968’, this new order is carried into
perfection. In this age of organised modernity, politics is about politicising the social
(Arendt, 1958); the welfare state is perfected in the sense of a new compromise
between freedom and discipline: life’s uncertainty is reduced for ‘social citizens’,
but the price for free ‘political citizens’ is to have their lives monitored and
normalised. An ever-higher proportion of an increasing Gross National Product
is distributed through state channels; social security legislation socialises risks and
minimises uncertainty, but standardises the biographies and identities of citizens;
distributive justice is somehow realised in a world of individual freedom, inequality
and difference, but the number of those entitled to social benefits is bounded.
The social and political world is not populated by ‘persons’, but by ‘functionaries’
in the service of large organisations in an ‘organisational state’ (Denhardt, 1981;
Lauman and Knoke, 1987). On this ‘closure’ of modernity in a thoroughly
organised modern welfare state and bureaucracy,Wagner (1994: 100) comments:
[I]t is easy to see that a welfare state ... has very little in common
with the liberal state as envisaged in the mid-19th century. It almost
shows more affinities with the ‘police state’ of the ancien regime. What
distinguishes it from the latter, though, is its commitment to the idea
that the sovereign people are the ultimate arbiter of how, and how
intensively, their own activities should be safeguarded and surveilled.
But both the society of late absolutism and the 20th century welfare
state showed ‘a kind of political a priori’ that allowed the emergence
and operation of authorities whose task was ‘the calculated supervision,
administration, and maximization of the forces of each and all’....
Governmentality (Foucault) refers to technologies that are employed
for structuring the space of the practices of domination. It assumes that
they can be structured, it is ‘programmatic’ in that it is characterized by
an eternal optimism that a domain of society can be administered better
or more effectively, that reality is, in some way or other, programmable.
The over-organised nature of a closed modernity leads to a new major crisis in
‘1968’ and beyond. Segments of the citizenry experience a severe loss of personal
autonomy, and start breaking up this organised modernity. People experience
globalisation, de-conventionalisation of work and consumption patterns in
34
The governance of problems: a map
economic practices. In politics and administration there is the loss of a legitimate
domination centre (state power), knowledgeable and managerially powerful
enough to ‘steer’ other spheres of society. In science, lay persons become fearful of
large-scale technologies, and scientists and scholars face a crisis of representation
of society, symbolised by the different evaluation of postmodernist epistemologies
that reject grand narratives, objectivity and law-like regularities in favour of
indeterminacy, difference, uniqueness and discontinuity. Living through the last
decades of the 20th century, many people feel overwhelmed by uncertainties
and risks, leading analysts to speak of ‘an end to modernity’ or postmodernism
(Lyotard, 1984), and a ‘risk society’ (Beck, 1992) dominated by a ‘politics of fear’
(Bauman, 1992).
The breaking up of organised modernity certainly does not justify speaking
about the ‘end of modernity’. However, especially possibilities for the formation
of social identities and political community and deliberation are in serious
trouble in contemporary Western societies. The repercussions for responsive
governance are serious.The problem-structuring conventions, habits and routines
of the governance of problems by the welfare and administrative state are being
questioned and criticised. Interestingly, these difficulties were anticipated already
by the French scholar Michel Foucault. Most of his informed conjectures have
been confirmed by later research on citizen attitudes and political behaviour
(overview in Dalton, 2000, 2008).
The ramifications of Paris-1968
In an interview in May 1984 with US philosopher Rabinovitz on the 1968 student
and workers’ rebellion in Paris, Foucault sketches the discontinuity between an
organised and a different kind of late modern politics in three developments.3
First, Foucault observes a de-ideologised, personalised type of problematisation put
forward for public debate by citizens:
As for the events of May 1968, it seems to me they depend on another
problematic. I wasn’t in France at that time; I only returned several
months later. And it seemed to me one could recognize completely
contradictory elements in it: on the one hand, an effort, which was very
widely asserted, to ask politics a whole series of questions that were not
traditionally a part of its statutory domain (questions about women,
about relations between the sexes, about medicine, about mental illness,
about environment, about minorities, about delinquency); and, on the
other hand, a desire to rewrite all these problems in the vocabulary
of a theory that was derived more or less directly from Marxism. But
the process that was evident at that time led not to taking over the
problems posed by the Marxist doctrine but, on the contrary, to a more
and more manifest powerlessness on the part of Marxism to confront
these problems. So that one found oneself faced with interrogations
35
The governance of problems
that were addressed to politics but had not themselves sprung from
a political doctrine. From this point of view, such a liberation of the
act of questioning seemed to me to have played a positive role: now
there was a plurality of questions posed to politics rather than the
reinscription of the act of questioning in the framework of a political
doctrine.
The ‘politicising the personal’, frequently claimed of feminist perspectives only,
can be generalised to the de-ideologisation of problematisation discourses among
citizens. It was the spirit of the times to shed one’s ideological feathers. In the
Netherlands, in 1966, a new pragmatic-progressivist4 political party, Democrats
’66, was established; it proclaimed to be totally pragmatic, free from any ideological
constraints on thinking about problems of public or political concern, and
solutions provided by collective state action. A recent op-ed in the new Dutch
daily NRC.next (6 April 2006: 19), launched in March 2006 to attract young
adult subscribers who no longer read ‘normal’ daily newspapers, demonstrates
how deeply entrenched among the younger generations is this de-ideologisation
and individualisation of political thinking, preference formation and demand
formulation (Stolle and Hooghe, 2004: 159; Bang, 2003):
People drop out of politics not because they are disinterested or
indifferent to the general interest; they drop out of the system because
it no longer links up to their needs.… Individualization and autonomy
are the mantras on which we were educated. That’s why we want to
effectively take action on our own.… This is the new participation
of the young generation. [translation RH]
This does not entail the complete disappearance of established political ideologies
from political relevance. Rather, such belief systems have to compete with
alternative, less articulated and more fragmented frames, beliefs, attitudes and
emotions. Authors like Giddens (1991) and Castells (1997) use the label ‘life
politics’ for the syndrome of small narratives, group identities, religious or ethnic
convictions and lifestyles that are somehow linked to the life projects of their
adherents. Beck (1997) speaks about a ‘subpolitics’ in which daily life decisions
made on the basis of personal or professional identities acquire strong political
meanings. Spheres traditionally considered professional and private, for example
nutrition advice and food consumption, become issues of political debate and
political power games. Foucault correctly designated this as a liberation of the
act of questioning from the standard political framings offered by the old elites.
Back in 1968, personalisation and de-ideologisation of political discourses began
as a revolt of a highly educated avant garde. In the beginning of the 21st century,
in societies with more advanced levels of educational achievement for larger
segments of their populations, it has become the basic political attitude of critical
and monitorial citizens that make up a large part of the adult, younger electorate.
36
The governance of problems: a map
Retreat on public goals, and of government
Second, in the same 1984 interview, Foucault already pointed out the difficulties
for public problem processing that this individualistic political thinking and
experiencing would entail:
For example, I don’t think that in regard to madness and mental illness
there is any ‘politics’ that can contain the just and definitive solution.
But I think that in madness, in derangement, in behavior problems,
there are reasons for questioning politics; and politics must answer these
questions, but it never answers them completely. The same is true for
crime and punishment: naturally, it would be wrong to imagine that
politics have nothing to do with the prevention and punishment of
crime, and therefore nothing to do with a certain number of elements
that modify its form, its meaning, its frequency; but it would be just
as wrong to think that there is a political formula likely to resolve the
question of crime and put an end to it. The same is true of sexuality:
it doesn’t exist apart from a relationship to political structures,
requirements, laws, and regulations that have a primary importance
for it; and yet one can’t expect politics to provide the forms in which
sexuality would cease to be a problem.
To put personal experience first in public problem processing, confronts politics
with insoluble or only partially solvable problems. In the long run, and compared
to the immediate solutions offered by a fully developed welfare state, would this
not imply more moderate expectations about the capacity to govern; and perhaps
a retreat on objectives (Wildavsky, 1980 [1979]) of state policy making? It is fair to
say that from the mid-1970s onwards, most nation states did indeed experience
an erosion of governing capacity (Peters, 1996). Most proximate policy makers felt
that they were no longer as capable of formulating, implementing and evaluating
policy as they were during the heyday of government during the 1960s and 1970s.
Especially national strategic policy, which requires the horizontal coordination
of policies and programmes across different domains, was a reason for concern.
For an explanation, some analysts pointed to technological and economic drivers
of globalisation. Particularly after the fall of communism, globalisation meant
that states had to enter an international competition for comparative advantage
in economic regulation. For the larger international corporations it meant an
opportunity for ‘nation shopping’: acquiring more favourable fiscal, environmental
and labour regulation through playing off one state against another. But for national
policy elites it meant a loss of national autonomy. This was exacerbated by an
increasingly difficult fiscal position for government. Political and administrative
elites felt that they had to ‘do more with less’. With the disappearance of ‘really
existing socialism’ as a disliked, undemocratic alternative, they expected their
citizens to become more critical about the performance of their own states.
37
The governance of problems
Hence, diffuse support for democratic governance would no longer be enough
to stay in power. Henceforward, output-related performance would loom larger
in citizens’ minds. This triggered numerous efforts of ‘reinventing government’
(Osborne and Gaebler, 1992) and ‘New Public Management’ (e.g. Hood, 1991).
It appeared that the state had only two alternatives: to transform itself either into
a ‘supermarket state’ (Olsen, 1988), that is, its functions would become those of
mere service delivery to citizens-as-consumers; or into a ‘partnering state’, that is,
its functions would be to enable and empower citizens, in their own ways and
on their own terms, to practice the freedom of personal growth and identity
building (Bang, 2003, 2004).
Other analysts attributed the loss of governing capacity to a more polarised and
politicised style of policy making over issues and cleavages in public opinion that
no longer reflected standard liberal–conservative or left–right schemata. Materialist
issues competed for public attention and public agenda status with post-material
issues (Inglehart, 1977, 1990); traditional issues of social status or class competed
with or were superseded by issues of gender, religion, ethics, risks, social impacts
of technological innovation, quality of life and many more.
Democracy in an age of distrust
Returning to the ramification of Paris-1968, if political ideology and citizen
needs and demands become uncoupled, Foucault anticipated problems of collective
will formation, deliberation and aggregation, authority and representation:
But it is also necessary to determine what ‘posing a problem’ to politics
really means. … in these analyses I do not appeal to any ‘we’ – to
any of those ‘wes’ whose consensus, whose values, whose traditions
constitute the framework for a thought and define the conditions in
which it can be validated. But the problem is, precisely, to decide if it
is actually suitable to place oneself within a ‘we’ in order to assert the
principles one recognizes and the values one accepts; or if it is not,
rather, necessary to make the future formation of a ‘we’ possible by
elaborating the question. Because it seems to me that ‘we’ must not be
previous to the question; it can only be the result – and the necessary
temporary result – of the question as it is posed in the new terms in
which one formulates it.
De-ideologisation and individualisation of problem-processing discourse among
citizens implies not only a rethinking of state functions and capacities; it also affects
political interactions between citizens, and between citizens and state authority
as well. For example, Hajer (in Hajer and Wagenaar, 2003: 95-6) describes how,
in the Dutch province of Friesland, the policy shift from nature conservation to
nature development is ‘constitutive’ of the region and its political community. He
attributes this precisely to the fact that it is only through and after confrontation
38
The governance of problems: a map
with a disliked policy programme that the many different types of people in that
region discover a shared interest and develop a counter-discourse to the national
policy.
If problems posed to politics by citizens are no longer pre-structured ideologically,
they obviously escape from traditions, collective memories, shared symbols and
other markers of collective identity that constitute polity, political decision and
action, representative democracy and even citizenship itself. How then to continue
to reason and work through problems together, to trust meaningful representation
structures and to arrive at public judgement and responsible collective decisions
and actions? This politicisation of the personal in a political structure dominated
by the welfare-cum-administrative state breeds distrust in representation and authority.
It creates the problem of democracy in an era of distrust (Rosanvallon, 2006:
235 ff). Rules of authority (by political and administrative elites), representation
(through elected politicians) and delegation (to civil servants, assisted by expert
advisers) that formed the basis of its functioning (Catlaw, 2006), have lost their
taken-for-granted character. Observes one Belgian political analyst for the 1990s:
Political innovation has created a new type of citizen-subject. People
now believe that democratic representation is hearing the echo of
one’s own weak voice in public policy. Representation assumed groups
and categories of citizens and meant to render their collective voice
(‘the general interest’), but this is no longer true. (Blommaert, 2001)
[translation RH]
This echoes for Belgium in the 1990s what Schattschneider (1960 [1988]: 113-4)
observed for Americans 30 years earlier:
Americans now think that their title covers the whole government, lock,
stock, and barrel, not merely a piece (the House of Representatives)
of it. Like all great proprietors they are not interested in details or
excuses; they want results. In other words, they believe that they have a
general power over the government as a whole and not merely some
power within the government.
Who influences problem structuring?
Of course, ordinary citizens never had much say over actual policy making
(Lindblom, 1968: 43ff). In fact, to classic political philosophers, politics is not
thinkable without the ruler–ruled relationship among participants in a political
community (Dauenhauer, 1986). But empirical political science shows the
ruler–ruled dichotomy to be permeable and differentiated in its modern guise.
Deferential citizens (Almond and Verba, 1963) were used to the natural authority
of political and administrative elites that actually governed the nation. As distant
policy makers, they did not mind ‘outsourcing’ their responsibilities for political
39
The governance of problems
judgement to more proximate policy makers – legislators, executive leaders, party
leaders, interest group leaders, especially economic interest group representatives
(Lindblom, 1977, 2001: 61ff, 236ff), bureaucrats, expert advisers or journalists
(Lindblom, 1968: 30, note 3). In a system of representative democracy, these
proximate policy makers are to some extent motivated to reconstruct citizens’
policy preferences because political parties compete for votes to win elections
and temporarily govern the country (Lindblom, 1968: 101ff).
Party leadership is motivated to seek out information on citizens’ preferred
policy positions (on major issues) over and beyond the insufficient information
provided by the ballot itself. How else to arrive at a party platform that may
attract a majority of voters? For this very reason, opinion polling and running
focus groups have become profitable political industries. Using these apparently
neutral tools as communication channels, the political and interest group-based
proximate policy makers simultaneously respond to and mould citizen demands.
The questions asked in political surveys and focus groups, and the composition
of the groups themselves, give proximate policy makers plenty of opportunity
to structure and channel the so-called free and spontaneous public debate by
ordinary citizens in their independent civic associations. Thus:
[A]ny policymaking system has a prodigious effect on the very
preferences, opinions, and attitudes to which it itself also responds. It
is not, therefore, a kind of machine into which are fed the exogenous
wishes, preferences, or needs of those for whom the machine is
designed and out of which come policy decisions to meet these wishes,
preferences, or needs.The machine actually manufactures both policies
and preferences. (Lindblom, 1968: 101-2)
It is no exaggeration to claim that this Janus-faced character of public policy
making and the entailed division of tasks in public policy making largely leaves
problem structuring in the hands and minds of the proximate policy makers.5 Thus,
one should not confuse convergence between expressions of citizens’ policy and
spending preferences and government policy as a sure sign that democracy works
(Dalton, 2008: 232).Through forms of political participation in institutionalised,
normal intermediary arrangements and associations – voting, party and labour
union membership, support of interest groups – active citizens exercise some
minimal influence on how proximate policy makers structure, and subsequently
solve, their problems. However, problem structuring was and is the proximate
policy maker’s task – and prerogative. As long as citizens were satisfied with the
compromise between autonomy and discipline provided by the welfare state, the
system of representative democracy and bureaucratic administration sufficed. All
this was thrown into turmoil and doubt when large segments of the electorate
lost their respect for authority, participated less and less in electoral politics, but
remained firm believers in democracy (Inglehart, 1999). In an overview article,
Russell Dalton (2000: 926) concludes:
40
The governance of problems: a map
Advanced industrial democracies are experiencing an evolution in the
patterns of electoral choice that flow from the breakdown of longstanding alignments and party attachments, the development of a more
sophisticated electorate, and efforts to move beyond the restrictions
of representative democracy.
These changes in citizens’ political attitudes and behaviour may partly be
interpreted as a rejection of older styles of politics and policy making; and as a
yearning for new forms that expand the democratic process and broaden public
involvement in the decisions affecting their lives (Dalton, 2000: 934, 2008: 237ff).
There is no denying that the action repertoire of critical and monitorial citizens
has increased. However, it appears to have taken a rather eclectic, short-term, egofocused, inwardly looking turn. Stolle and Hooghe (2004: 160-2) summarise the
newer forms of political participation in four key characteristics:
• First, modern citizens reject working in institutionalised umbrella associations;
instead, they prefer more flexible, clearly non-hierarchical network-like forms
of cooperation.
• Second, traditional public–private boundaries are questioned; for example,
political consumerism, consumer boycotts and other forms of lifestyle politics
mix private and public motivations in often opaque ways (Spaargaren and
Mol, 2008).
• Third, political mobilisation patterns are spontaneous, irregular and permit
easy exits.
• Fourth, they are potentially less collective and group-oriented in character; for
example, virtual participation through internet-based petitioning, or creditcard membership of interest groups, have an ego-centred character atypical
of traditional political participation in union meetings, mass rallies, or voice
in public hearings.
Being involved and engaged in politics through the newer modes of participation,
ironically, has not taken the deliberative turn towards more direct participatory
styles of politics, predicted or wished for by many political theorists (Barber,
1984, 1990; Dryzek, 1990). Regarding citizen influence on problem structuring,
the present situation may be characterised as follows. Traditional forms of
political participation conducive to at least minimal citizen influence on problem
structuring by proximate policy makers have seriously weakened.Voting turnout
has consistently declined in many Western democracies. Single-issue voting,
candidate-centred political campaigning and increased partisan volatility, effectively
diminish this minimal influence. Although it is too early to have a definitive
picture of the problem-structuring impacts of newer modes of participation,
they appear less conducive to serious opinion formation and interest aggregation
of citizens through deliberation and mutual adjustment needed for long-term
41
The governance of problems
institutionalised decision-making processes. American political scientist Russell
Dalton (2008: 257) warns that:
[C]itizen interest groups, social movements, individual citizens, and
various political groups are now more vocal about their political
interests and have greater access to the democratic process. At the
same time, the ability of political institutions to balance contending
interests – and to make interest groups sensitive to the collective needs
of society – has diminished.
French political historian and philosopher Pierre Rosanvallon (2006: 242-3) speaks
of ‘negative democracy’ in which the powers of rejection or veto have become the
dominant form of political intervention. For proximate policy makers and citizens
alike, the spreading but fluid forms of new political participation may be blurring
the visibility and legibility of citizens’ real, collective needs and wants. Essentially
negative and reactive, the newer forms of participation may be unable to serve to
structure or bear a positively defined collective project (Rosanvallon, 2006: 247).
In other words, notwithstanding a broadening of participation possibilities, it is
as yet unclear how the newer political participation contributes to a rebalancing
of citizens’ and proximate policy makers’ influence in the political dialogue on
effective problem structuring for public policy making. Regarding this vital issue
of democratic governance, political and policy analysts ought to ask the question:
to what extent do citizens depend on the efforts of benign or not-so-benign
proximate policy makers to reconstruct, aggregate and integrate their problem
representations and framings in authoritative problem definitions and choice?
To what extent does this entail the possibility or threat of gross mismatches
between problem sensing and framing by large segments, maybe a majority of the
population, and the professionalised or still ideology-driven problem structuring
and problem selection by political and administrative elites and proximate policy
makers?
Need for a problem-structuring approach
Recapitulation and conclusion
It is time to recapitulate and draw a normative conclusion.The conclusion is that
we need a problem-structuring approach to the governance of problems in order to
maintain, or perhaps restore, sufficient congruence between problems experienced,
perceived and framed by ordinary citizens, and the ways these problems are
reconstructed by proximate policy makers. More formally, contemporary democracies,
in order to maintain a sufficiently responsive system for the governance of problems, ought
to develop more reflexive institutions and practices of policy-oriented and polity-oriented
problem structuring.
42
The governance of problems: a map
This conclusion, or the practical goal for this book, is premised upon the
informed political estimate that at this juncture of the democratic journey a
structural mismatch between problem perception and structuring by larger
segments, if not a majority of the citizenry, and their proximate policy makers, is
a real possibility; and therefore a threat to democratic governance.To move broad
issues from the public agenda to political and decision agendas of public bodies, and
from there to feasible implementation programmes, undoubtedly requires more
precise problem definitions. This is the specialised task of authorities and expert
proximate policy makers. But citizens have come to dislike the imposition of their
governments’ well-ordered, but professionally and bureaucratically pre-structured
problem frames and top-down rule, no matter how effective and efficient in
their own terms. They rather want their governments to develop the skills and
institutions to prudently and democratically transform citizens’ experiences of
problematic situations and their ways of framing problem representations in truly
intersubjective but authoritative public definitions of policy problems. Better
governance implies political sensitivity to different types of problem structures; and more and
better reflexive problem structuring through better institutional, interactive and deliberative
designs for public debate.
The serious possibility for a structural mismatch between lay and expert
problem processing is derived from a number of observations and scientifically
warranted beliefs. Most important among them is that problem structuring is
the vital link in problem processing. Problem processing is usually divided in
two chunks: problem finding and problem solving.The more visible part, problem
solving through alternative creation and choice, naturally has drawn the most
empirical and analytic attention – both in theory and in political and administrative
practice. Consequently, the less visible, submerged part of problem processing,
that is, problem finding through problem sensing, problem identification, and
problem representation through problem framing has received far less attention.
Nevertheless, invisible problem representation through problem framing arguably
determines or triggers the alternatives considered in visible problem solving and
decision making. Thus, if we want to develop a less opaque view of problem
processing we need to (re)connect the visible to the invisible parts. I propose
that this is a feasible task if we focus on problem structuring. This part of problem
processing I define, following Dunn (2007: 6), as the self-conscious search, analysis
and evaluation of competing problem representations and problem framings, with a view
to their possible integration and definition. In a more political twist, one could also
define problem structuring as the political activity to produce information on divergent
views of what the problem is about, with a view to a synthetic, or at least a politically
plausible choice of authoritative problem definition (Hisschemöller and Hoppe, 2001).
In order to focus on problem-structuring aspects of public problem processing,
I coin the concept of governance of problems. By this concept I mean the ensemble
of all those institutions, beliefs, rules and practices that are used by citizens and other policy
players in public problem processing in a political system.The concept of governance, of
course, is supposed to carry all the qualifications usually meant by most authors
43
The governance of problems
when they warn against focusing on the state or the government as an allegedly
monopolistic player in defining the common good and public policy. I agree with
all connotations of institutional complementarity and more inclusive participation
implied by the semantic switch from government to ‘governance’ (as argued
in Chapter One); as long as it is acknowledged that the state has a number of
interdependent political and administrative resources – legislation, taxation, use of
legitimate physical force – which other players in society need in order to better
solve problems with a collective, public or solidarity character.
A governance of problems approach both reasserts and supersedes the
current policy-analytic or puzzling approach to problem structuring. Problem
structuring, as a property of a political system and process, is as much about powering
and participation as it is about puzzling. This is a fortiori the case in a normative
approach informed by the possibility of a structural mismatch between problem
structuring by ordinary citizens and proximate policy makers. In other words,
the normative, practical task of this book – to ensure sufficient congruence or
responsiveness between problem structuring by citizens and by proximate policy
makers, in a more reflexive policy- and polity-oriented governance of problems
– has definite implications for its scientific goal: to explore and to develop a problemstructuring approach to the governance of problems; and to do so in a way that pays balanced
attention to puzzling, powering, and participation.
Research themes for a problem-structuring approach
Looking at citizens’ potential impacts on problem structuring, the starting
point is that in the governance system of representative democracy coupled
with the welfare-cum-administrative state complex, ordinary citizens largely
‘outsourced’ problem structuring tasks to proximate policy makers. Proximate
policy makers resided in institutionalised intermediary organisations like political
parties, umbrella organisations like labour unions and employers’ associations,
and the vested interest groups. Because they had incentives to pay attention to
or reconstruct citizen wants, needs, desires and policy positions, citizens kept
some sort of minimal control; yet, this control was largely exercised within the
boundaries provided by political, administrative, business and scientific elites in their
ideology- or profession-driven, standardised policy problem framings. Roughly
since Paris-1968, citizen behaviour and political participation is transforming in
two directions. First, there is a consistent downward trend in participation in electoral
politics and the intermediary institutions. Politicians and other proximate policy makers
increasingly have serious problems in standing up to their conventional roles as
intermediaries between government and citizens in civil society. In other words,
neither the outside-in initiative model of democracy, nor the inside-access and
mobilisation model of the corporatist state, which uses selected interest groups as
intermediaries, performs as well as it did before. Certainly, ordinary citizens have
become more aware of the dividing line in democratic politics between elites
and ordinary people. This probably is a major motive for the younger, better44
The governance of problems: a map
educated, more critical and monitorial cohorts of citizens to develop alternative
forms of political participation – which is the second trend.
Through social movements, informal and sometimes virtual networks, more
sophisticated and critical citizens have opened up political communication
channels for strong, short-term responses to experienced policy failures. However,
it is far from clear to what extent these newer modes of political participation
are functionally equivalent mechanisms for exerting some control on proximate
policy makers’ problem-structuring and problem-solving activities.
How is the governance of problems, especially responsive governance, affected
by such changes? How do they affect previously normal processes of problem
structuring in public policy making? Are citizens really forfeiting chances for
a responsive governance of their problems? Or are we overlooking alternative,
less visible perhaps, structures and dynamics for aligning problem processing by
citizens and proximate policy makers?
Given this overall problématique, in this book I will ask and answer a number
of implied questions. A first set of questions tackles the socio-political contexts of
policy-oriented puzzling and powering in the governance of problems:
• How may one usefully conceptualise problem structures? Is it possible to
distinguish between types of differently structured problems? More particularly,
can this be done for political task environments, that is, for politically dominant
or hegemonic, and authoritatively chosen problem definitions and their
translation into implementation routines and doctrines?
• Given the increased cultural fragmentation among political audiences, do
different political cultures align with differently structured types of problems?
What does this mean for cultural congruence between citizens and proximate
policy makers?
• Given the trend in policy making to decompose the governance task into
more and more functionally separate policy domains, in which policymaking tasks are accomplished by recognised players in network structures,
do different types of networks recursively reproduce certain types of problemstructuring processes? Or do problem structures vary independently of types
of institutionalised policy networks?
A second set of questions particularly addresses the puzzling or policy-analytic aspect
of policy-oriented problem structuring:
• How did epistemological and methodological justifications of professional
policy analysis develop over time; and how did they adapt to the changing
political landscapes for problem structuring and solving? Especially, how did
the turn to a more argumentative, problem-sensitive and frame-reflective type
of policy analysis come about?
45
The governance of problems
• What does this turn mean in practice? Is it possible to distinguish between
several doable styles in the practice of policy analysis? Is there a link between
these styles and the epistemological battles of academic policy analysts?
So far, research questions have addressed policy-oriented aspects of problems
structuring. They concern aspects of problem structuring that are relevant from
the point of view of the design, implementation and evaluation of specific policies.
However, there are other aspects of problem structuring that have a broader
context, in that they affect the polity as a whole or the entire set of non-policyspecific aspects of the governance of problems for a political system. Therefore,
I address a third set of questions focusing on the polity-oriented, democratic and
participatory aspects of a governance of problems:
• Given the divergent nature and different structures of public policy problems,
can contemporary democracies successfully deal with all problem types? Or,
alternatively, do different types of democracies have a bias in favour of some
and at the disadvantage of other differently structured problems?
• Given the practical, political aim of a problem-structuring approach to
democratic and responsive governance of problems, is it possible, and if yes,
how, to nudge democracy towards more reflexive, deliberative and participatory
modes of policy- and polity-oriented problem structuring?
Having formulated an overall research theme and more specific questions, I
will set out a conceptual framework that elucidates the idea of the governance
of problems. It will bring out the theoretical meanings and notions behind the
questions asked. It will also clarify the composition of this book as a whole.
A conceptual model of the governance of problems
Multiple accounts of policy and policy making
On the face of it, the idea of the governance of problems could simply draw on
the dominant paradigm of policy and conventional map of the policy-making
process. This is, of course, the stages and cycle model of instrumentally rational
problem solving. Wayne Parsons (1995: 77) gives a depiction of this hegemonic
mapping as presented in Figure 2.2.
The inadequacy of this model is that ‘problem (situation)’ and ‘problem definition’
are just the opening moves or stages in the cycle.This ushers in all the conceptual
limitations and inadequacies of the iceberg model of problem processing.What is
needed is a model that understands the policy-making process without implicit or
explicit comparison to the normative, linear and instrumental model.Also, we need
a model that pictures policy making as a continuous questioning process, without
implicitly starting from a hypothetically resolved problem; and then, in justifying
the solution, proceeds to a series of logically related, but ‘discrete’ thought steps.
46
The governance of problems: a map
Figure 2.2: Stages and cycle model of the policy-making process
Problem
Evaluation
Problem definition
Identifying alternative
responses/solutions
Evaluation of options
Implementation
Source: Parsons (1995: 77)
Selection of policy option
If problem structuring is the continuous interpretive process that permeates and
drives the entire multiframe and multiplayer policy-making process, the model
ought to be amended. Dunn’s (2007: 4) version renders the notion of a governance
of problems through problem structuring much better (see Figure 2.3).
Figure 2.3: Dunn’s model of a process of integrated policy analysis
POLICY
PERFORMANCE
Evaluation
Forecasting
Problem
structuring
OBSERVED
POLICY
OUTCOMES
Problem
structuring
POLICY
PROBLEMS
Problem
structuring
EXPECTED
POLICY
OUTCOMES
Problem
structuring
Recommendation
Monitoring
PREFERRED
POLICIES
Source: Dunn (2007: 4)
47
The governance of problems
However, this mapping still conceptualises problem structuring as a central
intellectual activity in the set of activities making up policy design. Dunn locates
problem structuring only in the puzzle or policy-analytic aspect of policy making.
Also, he tends to see policy analysis primarily as decision support by proximate
policy makers for political authorities. It is not clear how his model would include
the powering and participation aspects of problem structuring by the total array
of players differently involved in policy making, citizens included.
On closer examination of the state of the art in policy studies, the dominant
paradigm and model is contested by at least two alternatives (Colebatch, 2002a,
2005, 2006b): policy as structured interaction, or play of power constrained by formal
and informal rules on political strategies and tactics of partisan mutual adjustment
among stakeholders and proximate policy makers; and policy as social construction of
meaning, conferred on concepts used in (competing) political and administrative
discourses on social problems, policy programmes and projects, but also discourse
on political leadership and political obstacles or opposition. It is important here to
clarify my response to this situation. Whether or not one sees the existence of multiple
accounts as problematic or not – and if not, how one sees the relationships between them
– ultimately determines how one conceptualises policy and policy making.
The sacred model
Colebatch (2006b: 318) calls the accounts of ‘policy as authoritative choice’ and
‘policy analysis as advice or decision support’ the official or sacred account. It
is used by politicians, proximate policy makers and experts as front-office talk
because it offers excellent rhetorical means to rationalise and sell the outputs
of policy making to voters and citizens. After all, citizens expect government to
respond to their problems; so the apparently rational movement from problem
through decision to solution is common sense. It easily justifies the outsourcing
of responsibilities for political judgement by ordinary citizens as lay persons; and
vice versa, legitimises the prerogatives and specialised tasks of proximate policy
makers, expert advisers and political authorities.
However, the sacred account is used, both in theory and practice, not because of
its empirical accuracy. Actually, the puzzle is rather why, in the face of mounting
evidence for alternative models (e.g. Sabatier, 1991), it is still the dominant account.
Even more so, because in policy practice too there is ‘a disconnect between the
analysts’ perception of self-worth (often drawn from the rational-actor model)
and the real contribution that the individual makes in the nooks and crannies of
the policy process’ (Radin, 2000: 183).
In essence, the dominant model serves as a social myth; it is a Platonic ‘noble lie’
without which practice is alleged to fall apart. It validates the outcome of policymaking processes as a rational account of how politicians make a difference. By
itself this shows that the problem-solving account has strategic power implications
for the practice of policy work. For example, by saying ‘We are talking just ideas
now, not decisions’, policy makers implicitly distinguish between policy analysis
48
The governance of problems: a map
or design, and policy adoption or decision making. Drawing such a boundary
implicitly reinforces status and power differences between proximate policy makers
or analysts, and authorities and elected politicians who, in the regulated play of
power, defend their monopoly on authoritative decisions against other policy
players. Similarly, stressing ‘This is mere implementation!’ implicitly commands
street-level bureaucrats and non-state organisations in a policy network around
some issue not to challenge the dominant problem definition or adapt policy
objectives inherent in adopted policy designs.Yet, such challenges and adaptations
might well merit the label ‘rational’ if they are reflexive responses to changing
circumstances on the ground.These examples alone suffice to show how puzzling
and powering are inextricably tied in policy-making processes.
The profane model
The challenger, called the ‘profane’ or experiential account, is policy as structured
interaction and rule-constrained power play. In such an account the advice or
decision support by policy ‘analysts’ is embodied in policy ‘workers’ as political
auxiliaries, as networkers, boundary spanners or policy diplomats, or as policy
entrepreneurs (Colebatch et al, 2010: in press). Not analytical competencies,
but negotiation, ‘soft’ coordination, maintenance of good contacts with other
key players, and instigation or ‘sparking-off ’ of supportive or at least non-veto
stances, become key social skills for trained policy workers. In these types of
back-office account for policy it makes no sense to speak of the rational solution,
based on unshakable evidence and the persuasive power of the better arguments.
The adopted course of action rather appears epiphenomenally as victorious
alternative because it just happened to get more political support from stakeholders
in processes of mutual adjustment based on calculated interests and political
deals. Policy is not a rational solution to some problem; to the extent that it is a
cognitive or cultural phenomenon, it results from partisan analyses (Lindblom,
1968) inspired by fixed commitments of important resources by vested interests
and known stakeholders in issue machines. And here too, policy is part of shaping
the political action itself. Saying ‘We need a gun control, anti-abortion or climate
change policy’ is a political claim for attention on other policy makers; it is a
politically inspired attempt at problem framing or even for exclusive control over
problem definition; it seeks commitment of (some of) their resources for achieving
your policy objectives.
A social-constructivist double perspective
It bears stressing that the sacred and profane, official and experiential, front- and
back-office accounts of policy and policy making are being actively used both
in academic theory and political-administrative practice.These are plausible facts
in the social construction account of policy. If policy is viewed as being part
of political sense making, as claims to control and fix the meaning of concepts
49
The governance of problems
used in political debates and struggles, it is only logical to apply this insight to
the policy-making process itself. It means we may subsume the sacred and profane
accounts of policy under the social construction account. The implication is that policy
making may be constructed or viewed as, indeed, encompassing puzzling (sacred,
rational problem-solving account), powering (profane, structured interaction and
power-play account) and participation (because policy players are all engaged in
exercises of sense making and meaning giving).
However, more important even, from a social constructivist point of view, policy
making becomes the governance of problems. Participants in policy making all do so
from different positions in space-time, with different experiences, stakes, values,
norms and beliefs. The possibility of collective action may become a reality only
if they manage to create some common or shared understandings on why they
seek cooperation and collective action at all.The essential process therefore is the
joint construction of problems as a condition for joint responses. This can only
be achieved by insisting that one’s understanding of a situation as problematic,
and of some joint actions as better than other responses, ought to be recognised
by other participants as valid. In other words, problem claims processing is the way
in which situations come to be seen as ‘shared problems’ to which collective
projects, actions and plans are the proper ‘shared response’. Analysis or instigation,
rationality or power, puzzling or powering – from a social constructivist position
they appear as alternative or entwined modes of claiming (and making sure) that
certain problems come to be shared so as to be processed for joint responses.That
is why I propose to view policy making as the governance of problems.
Mapping the governance of problems.
The purpose of the map to be presented here (see Figure 2.4) is to help
understand why problem definitions are, or are not, or only partially, accepted in
public, collective action.The perspective is a social-constructivist interpretation of
problem processing by political and policy players, in which there is due attention
to puzzling, powering and participation in mostly sub-surface problem finding
and problem structuring, and directly visible problem solving. Figure 2.4 depicts
how, in this view, transition, framing and design dynamics of problem structuring
connect socio-political and knowledge contexts to each other and to policy
designs.6 They are the ‘transmission belts’ of problem structuring in a governance
of problems.The theoretical claim, to be illustrated in the rest of the book, is that
these translation, framing and design dynamics correspond to politically dominant
problem frames and problem structures.
Designs as strategic problem-solution couplings
Above, it was argued that citizens outsource their policy-making tasks to more
proximate policy makers and authorities. These policy players have moderate
incentives to reconstruct citizens’ preferences in order to maintain their roles
50
The governance of problems: a map
Figure 2.4: Map of mechanisms in problem structuring and a governance of
problems
POLICY DESIGN
How/why are problems
structured and selected/
chosen?
Problem-solution
couplings, backed by
policy-relevant
arguments and
political claims
How do policies ‘mean’?
SOCIO-POLITICAL CONTEXT
KNOWLEDGE CONTEXT
Experiential constructions
Practitioners’ constructions
Scientific constructions
How/why are problem frames
socially and politically distributed
and constructed?
Cultures in society
Policy-making processes
in (functional) policy
subsystems
and functions. Whether justified or not, they will certainly claim that their
policy designs address citizens’ concerns and issues. Such authoritative claims
will always be there; policy designs and decisions are never tabula rasa, emerging
from the heads of individual policy makers trying to solve problems. Therefore,
quite different from the stages and cycle model, analysis departs from the upper
box representing adopted policy designs and standing implementation regimes.
Policy design is inextricably interlaced with processes of structured interaction
between politicians and other proximate policy makers, resulting in authoritative
decision making or policy adoption, and structured commitments of resources
in implementation regimes. Quite simply, it means that, once politically decided,
adopted and officially proclaimed by government, policy designs cannot be
changed or ignored as easily as other types of political preferences or decisions.
Shore and Wright (1997) argue that policy designs establish order by structuring
discourse on problems, goals and means through framings that bolster the authority
of rulers by limiting and neutralising potentially opposing views. Majone and
Wildavsky (1979: 165) observe that policy designs, once politically adopted, tend
to become doctrines, publicly justifying governmental intervention programmes
and routines. True, during implementation, policies are continuously subjected
to multiple influences of individuals, interests and institutions. Hence, only after
political argumentation, debate and decision taking in some representative or
other properly authorised body, political protagonists of a policy design have a
chance (but no guarantee) to infuse a policy design with sufficient political power
and support so as to acquire its disciplining and justificatory function during
implementation (Majone, 1978: 211).
51
The governance of problems
The justificatory function of official policy texts is essentially in its promise
to achieve certain goals in a public effort to meet citizens’ needs and solve or
keep a problem under control. Thus, in a problem-processing approach, analysts
need not be interested in all elements of policy designs. Instead, the focus will be
on claims about problem-solution couplings7 and their argumentative backing
in policy documents reflecting the beliefs of their designers. It is imperative to
carefully analyse from a cognitive-political perspective the types of problems posed
to government by its citizens. Logically speaking, all problems are experienced as
non-acceptable discrepancies between real situations and desired future situations;
between a socially constructed ‘is’ and ‘ought’. However, from a political as well
as cognitive point of view, they vary in terms of degree of consent on relevant, valid
knowledge on what is and will or can be; as well as in terms of degree of consent on values,
norms and standards at stake in defining a desirable future situation. This insight is the
basis for a fundamental typology of different kinds of public problems: structured,
unstructured and two types of moderately structured problems (see Chapters One
and Three). It means to start to unravel the twists and turns of policy processes by
empirical, interpretive reconstructions of policy belief systems; in particular, what
they tell us about politically dominating problem definitions, and the social and
political distribution of alternative problem framings (Van de Graaf and Hoppe,
1989: 100-29; Hisschemöller, 1993: 39-41; Fischer, 2003: 191-8). This book is
built on the thesis that the differently structured types of problems, through
translation, framing and design dynamics, have selective affinities or congruencies
with different cultures as ways of life, different types of policy networks, different
types of doing policy analysis and even different types of democracy and citizen
participation. Ultimately, the successful dealing with different types of problems
requires different styles of governance. This is the normative and political,
pragmatic implication for the good governance of problems.
Translation dynamics
Policy designs and their hegemonic problem definition impact on wider social
contexts through translation dynamics (Schneider and Ingram, 1997: 79).They are
about ‘how policies mean’ (Yanow, 1996). Given the nature of policy making
as a question-and-answer game, it is imperative to pay attention to the public’s
role as an active audience. The model distinguishes (only) between two types of
socio-political contexts (depicted in the lower right-hand box in Figure 2.4).
First, the meaning of policy designs and implementation regimes is constructed
through interpretive processes by groups, or target populations in society at large;
they are conceptualised as cultures and ways of life in society (see Chapter Four).
Second, translation dynamics also involve the more immediate policy domains
through interpretive processes in policy politics, that is, types of politics and mutual
adjustment between proximate policy makers working in networks of specific
policy domains (see Chapters Five and Six).
52
The governance of problems: a map
Using grid-group cultural theory, congruencies will be revealed between
preferred ways of problem structuring by proximate policy makers and certain
ways of life or cultures as coherent configurations of institutions, beliefs and
behavioural strategies (see Chapter Four). Firms, civil society associations and
individual citizens will experience a policy design’s impact on their action
strategies and options. This happens mostly in their interpretation of policy
messages (of which official policy texts will be only a small segment); and in
their encounters with policy instruments wielded by policy implementers. Both
interpretations and encounters are routinely informed by their own cultures or
ways of life, with their typical day-by-day problem-solving practices. Depending
on how policy designs impact on their cultures, citizens will construct their own
favourable or not-so-favourable interpretation of the meaning of the policy
for them. In such translation processes, citizens’ long-term, stable conceptions
of the role of government, of implementing agencies, of interest groups and of
citizenship itself are shaped and reshaped. Patterns of political power, interaction
and participation are reinforced or weakened as well (Schneider and Ingram,
1997). This is how policy implementation practices are always a communicative
and interpretive process between policy players and ordinary citizens (Grin and
Van de Graaf, 1996).
The translation dynamics of policy framings and designs may also impact on
how political authorities and specialised proximate policy makers themselves,
formally and informally, cooperate and compete in the play of power around
policy problems. In the ‘cacophony’ of societal debate and preference formation
in civil society and the media, authorities and proximate policy makers turn to
(and actively facilitate the crystallisation of) more conveniently arranged functional
networks of policy-relevant players (Lauman and Knoke, 1987). They mostly
consist of bureaucratic agencies, business organisations, civil society associations
and other nongovernmental single-issue organisations, around policy issues defined
by themselves: ‘The practice in almost all governments is for policies to emerge
from the “stovepipes” that link functional experts at all levels of government with
interest groups and with other advocates within the policy area’ (Peters, 1996: 2).
Thus, politicians and policy makers have come to rely more on systems
of functional, neo-corporatist interest representation, next to the traditional
nationwide systems of representative democracy. In these functional policy
domains or subsystems, networks of proximate policy makers are involved in a
policy issue on a continuous basis. Bureaucratic agencies and other types of public
sector organisations involved in implementation of the policy ‘read’ the official
policy design; and subsequently adapt or redirect their standard operating routines,
personnel policies, budget strategies and strategic plans. Like in the translation
dynamics for culture, for these policy domains the question arises as to whether
or not types of problem structuring correspond to particular types of policy
networks; particularly, the ways they structure rules of interaction, inclusion and
exclusion from the ‘corridors of power’.
53
The governance of problems
Framing dynamics
Moving on from the translation dynamics of powering and participation in the
socio-political context, the map focuses next on the puzzle aspect of framing
dynamics. In politics, problem representations and framings are always contested;
but the contest is not random or open. One may observe that policy designs and
the socio-political contexts co-construct, as it were, a knowledge context (depicted
in the lower left-hand box of Figure 2.4). There is a kind of co-evolution of a
direct translation dynamics between design and knowledge context; and a mutual
framing dynamics between socio-political and knowledge contexts. The major
issue here is how different types of knowledge on how to frame problems are socially and
politically distributed.
The concept of ‘knowledge’ is a problematic and multifaceted one (see Rooney
et al, 2003b; Rooney and Schneider, 2005: 1936). Knowledge is different from data
and information. Data are loose ‘bits’ like numbers, words, sounds and pictures.
When organised one way or another, they are the building blocks of information,
for example as texts, statistics, tapes or movies. Knowledge comes about when
intellects process, make sense of and give meaning to information. This is a
complex social activity that situates knowers in relation to larger interpretive
contexts. When talking of politics, policy making and problem processing, these
larger interpretive-relational contexts are policy designs, policy (implementation)
regimes in networks, and the cultural, socio-political context. Culture, and
cultural differences, provide individuals and groups with the basic templates or
intellectual, attitudinal, emotional and institutional ‘compass’ directions with
which to bring coherence and system to their interpretation of policy-relevant
information. Regarding specific problems, policy texts, verbal communications
and other information about policy designs provide a more focused interpretive
context for their responses.
But there is a social-relational context to knowledge as well. This is why some
analysts think we should not talk about ‘knowledge’ as a noun for a static
phenomenon, but about ‘knowing’ as a verb for giving meaning and developing
understanding (Rooney et al, 2003b: 3).These processes transcend solitary minds.
They depend on social interactions and structures by intellects that occupy
different cultural orientations and domains, and belong to different policy
networks, or play out different roles in the same network, but do communicate
with each other in some structured ways.There is an important difference in how
people socially construct meaning. As cultural ‘animals’ belonging to particular
ways of life, knowledge construction has a high ‘beer mat’ scent; it will be largely
experiential, that is intuitive, sometimes unarticulated, or even tacit and nonverbal.As policy network actors, proximate policy makers construct meaning and
knowledge in much more conscious, deliberate and articulated ways. However,
as practitioners’ knowledge, their constructions still display considerable elements
of unarticulated know-who, know-what and know-how, and tacit learning
from (sometimes) trendy ‘best practice’. It is only as members of professional or
54
The governance of problems: a map
scientific communities that knowledge construction takes on full-blown forms of
articulation, codification and hence publicly transparent knowledge, emphasising
know-why and evidence-based learning.
In this book, the focus is not on the experiential and practitioners’ knowledge
constructions; or on the role of the media in the social constructions of problems
and knowledge. Instead, attention is trained on scientific and professional
knowledge, especially on the art and craft of policy analysis and giving policy
advice or being a good policy worker (in Chapters Five through Seven). Of
course, the important insight that professional and scientific knowledge never
stands alone is acknowledged. Policy analysis can no longer be conceptualised as
putting ‘theory’ into ‘practice’. Policy analysis is a dense and frequently opaque
interplay of lay, practitioners’ and professional or academic knowledge. In a very
real sense, it is co-constructed by the other manifestations of knowledge. Coconstruction of different types of knowledge is the central tenet in contemporary
theories on the changing role of science in society, like post-normal science
(Funtowicz and Ravetz, 1992; Ravetz, 1999), Mode 2 science (Nowotny et al,
2001), new relationships between universities, industry and government (Etzkowitz
and Leydesdorff, 1997),not to mention the many digitally supported knowledge
networks that have sprung up during the last decade to connect experts such as
academicians and professionals with practitioners (Halffman and Hoppe, 2005).
In this new knowledge landscape, policy advice and policy analysis moved from
neo-positivist and critical-rational modes of ‘speaking truth to power’ in the
direction of interpretive and neo-pragmatist modes of ‘making sense together’
(Hoppe, 1999).
Design dynamics
If looked at from the perspective of usable knowledge for and in policy (Lindblom
and Cohen, 1979; Lindblom, 1990), the knowledge context of policy design
processes is frequently underdetermined and understructured. Design dynamics is
the way in which political order is argumentatively extracted from and imposed on
available stocks of knowledge with a view to coming to a political judgement and
political decisions on how to act as a polity. Design dynamics are about the politicalcum-intellectual structuring and political choice of problem definitions. Designs come about,
alternatively, as quasi-rational use of the toolkit of methods of optimisation under
constraints; or as satisficing by trained problem solvers like policy analysts (Simon,
1992; Dunn, 2004); or as boundedly rational processes of incremental borrowing,
tinkering, lesson drawing, knowing-in-action and reflection-on-practice by
reflective practitioners (Braybrooke and Lindblom, 1963; Schön, 1983; Rose,
1993). Design dynamics at their best feature what Dunn (2004: 1-2) considers
the true calling of policy analysis: ‘inquiry designed to create, critically assess, and
communicate information that is useful in understanding and improving policies’.
In the real world of policy analysis, higher-order problem-structuring heuristics
are the actual drivers behind design processes (Hoppe, 1983). Normatively, problem
55
The governance of problems
structuring would see to the ‘congruence’ of lower-order problem-solving
methods (Dunn, 1988: 724): ‘The appropriateness of a particular type of method
is a function of its congruence with the type of problem under investigation’.
Thus, from a prescriptive and methodological point of view, problem structuring
is about putting intellectually defensible and politically authoritative closure
on debates about constraints on problem definitions and solutions through
responsible problem decomposition, and prudent constraint sequencing during
the design process. Some problem decompositions and some forms of constraint
sequencing do less violence to problem sensing and framing outside of proximate
and authoritative policy-making circles; and, therefore, result in more effective,
efficient and legitimate policies as attempted problem solutions. Chapter Seven
explores what such a frame-reflective and problem-oriented method of policy
structuring and design would look like. Policy analysis as ‘making sense together’
requires more reflexive problem structuring; which in its turn requires a rethinking
of the toolkit for ‘doable’ policy analysis, policy advice, or policy work as a craft.
Perhaps needless to repeat that policy designs are not merely cognitive or rational
processes. Political, institutional, organisational and other social and structural
forces bring their constraining effects to bear on design processes. We know that
politicians judge policy proposals from a knowledge interest in the risks and
opportunities of power enlargement, maintenance or loss (Schneider and Ingram,
1997: 111ff; ’t Hart et al, 2002).The admissibility and weight of policy information
about effectiveness, efficiency and organisational and financial feasibility more
often than not also depends on answers to questions such as ‘How many believe
this?’,‘Who are they?’, and ‘With what intensity do they believe it?’; or ‘How will
this policy proposal affect electoral chances and coalition strategy?’ (Webber, 1992).
Bureaucratic agencies too have their own interests in political visibility,
maintaining a policy culture and decision-making style, and standard operating
procedures. All of these are potential sources of constraints on problem framings
and definitions. The same is true for institutionalised boundary work by science
advisers in independent think tanks and government-sponsored boundary
organisations between science and politics (Jasanoff, 1990; Guston, 2001; Hoppe,
2005). Besides that, the line between framing and design dynamics sometimes is
blurred and permeable. Politicians, interest groups, policy analysts and sometimes
even science advisers act as policy entrepreneurs (Kingdon, 1984; Roberts and
King, 1991; Zahariadis, 2003) working both sides of the line: influencing public
opinion on problem definitions or favoured problem solutions, and simultaneously
working hard to get problem definitions and solutions accepted in authoritative
policy texts.
Political and bureaupolitical realities ought to be accounted for in a view of
design dynamics. Charles Lindblom (1968: 32-33) already taught that the puzzling
of policy analysis is not a substitute for the play of power; as partisan analysis
it ‘does not avoid fighting over policy; it is a method of fighting’. And Aaron
Wildavsky (1980 [1979]: 17) used to say that policy making is both cogitation
and interaction, where clever and creative cogitation is in the service of improved
56
The governance of problems: a map
political interaction. Political interaction improves when there are less ill-structured
problems or structural mismatches between problem definitions and policy designs
by authoritative decision makers and problem framings by other relevant political,
societal and economic actors in the system.
Normative implications for the polity
So far, translation, framing and design dynamics have been discussed as policyspecific mechanisms of problem-structuring processes. Jointly, they can be said
to make up a polity’s drivers in the governance of problems. It means that, next
to a policy-oriented approach, one should also pay attention to a polity-oriented
approach to the governance of problems. Institutions matter, and should be
brought back into policy analysis. This is where a governance of problems
addresses what Paul Diesing (1962: 171-2) calls political rationality: the concern
about the preservation of a sufficiently well-developed, long-term and productive
problem-processing capacity for the political system or polity as a whole.This can
be done through linking up the conception of problem structuring and problem
processing to normative political theory.
From such a perspective, the problem typology and notions of responsible
problem structuring and reasoned political choice of problems have considerable
implications.They can be summarised as the development of a normative theory
of the governance and democracy of problems. Any political regime or system
ought to have sufficiently flexible and robust governance structures and policymaking repertoires to deal in appropriate ways with all types of problems. The
final three chapters of this book explore such implications. Chapter Eight takes
steps in the direction of a democratic meta-theory for the governance of problems.
Chapter Nine reflects on the possibilities of a meta-governance of problems; that
is, nudging the political system to more reflexive, deliberative and participatory
modes of problem structuring. In this framework, different forms of citizen
participation are studied from the angle of different types of problem structuring.
Special attention is given to ironies and perplexities of running deliberative and
participatory democratic experiments in policy analysis.
A final theme in a polity-oriented normative view on the governance of
problems, addressed in Chapter Ten, concerns the relationship between powering
and puzzling. In their handbooks and other writings, policy analysts too selfevidently and unreflexively attribute primacy to puzzling or analysis over powering
or instigation. Normatively, this amounts to a preference for a politics of vision.
Yet, in practice, more often than not one experiences the primacy of instigation
practices over design quality. Shapiro, a one-time political appointee heading
the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA), as part of the US
President’s Office of Management and Budget (OMB), summarises his experience
by the observation that when politics and analysis openly conflict, politics always
trumps analysis (quoted in West, 2005). When this is condoned, one may speak
of a politics of will. More frequently, the asymmetrical relation between power
57
The governance of problems
and reason is regretfully acknowledged, an attitude characteristic for a politics
of realism or resignation. These are all views that I reject in favour of a politics
of hope and prudence. Applied to the governance of problems this means that
puzzling and powering, in designed alternation or oscillation, and under steadily
increasing participation and probing by involved people, can work in tandem for
wise societal guidance.
Notes
Readers who are unfamiliar with or who are keen on clarity of conceptual distinctions
before they are introduced and explained in this section, are advised to turn to Box 2.1
on pages 30-31, where major concepts in a governance of problems approach are listed.
1
A philosophical reflection on and elaboration of this tension is to be found, under the
label of problematology, in Turnbull (2005).
2
Michel Foucault, interview: Polemics, Politics and Problematizations, source: http://
foucault.info/foucault/interview.html
3
This double label deliberately evokes the American historical connotations of ‘pragmatism’
and ‘progressivism’. Positioning themselves as ‘outsiders’ whose intention was a reform
of the Dutch political system of pillarised, consensus democracy, D’66 embraced nonideological pragmatism as its political philosophy, and as frequent concrete political stance
it adopted outright pro-technocratic and pro-professionalisation positions. In the 1980s
and 1990s, they evolved into a kind of discourse coalition builder between Conservatives
(VVD) and Liberals (Labour).
4
Problem-structuring heuristics and methods will keep us occupied in major parts of
Chapters Three through Seven of this book. Here, the focus is more on the institutionalised
and newer modes of political participation by citizens, and their potential impact on
problem structuring in the democratic governance of problems.
5
In presenting this map, I gratefully acknowledge inspiration from Schneider and Ingram
(1997: 73ff).
6
7
In Chapter Three it is explained why I speak of problem-solution couplings.
58
THREE
Analysing policy problems: a
problem-structuring approach
We do not discover a problem ‘out there’; we make a choice about
how we want to formulate a problem. (Lindblom and Cohen, 1979: 50)
Introduction
This chapter introduces the typology of policy problems that underlies the rest
of the book.This requires some preliminary conceptual work. Choosing a socialconstructivist approach, the first section develops the perspective of a politics of
meaning. It views politics as the collective attempt to control a polity’s shared
response to the adversities and opportunities of the human condition.The second
section gives an overview of how others have approached the social and political
analysis of policy issues or problems. Here the proposal is to look at problem
structuring as socio-cognitive processes that frame political task environments.
From this perspective, four types of policy problems are posited: structured,
unstructured and two types of moderately structured problems.The third section
discusses properties of structured versus unstructured problems; and analyses how
unstructured problems get to be structured through problem decomposition
and constraint sequencing.These two processes do not always follow the gradual
increase in professional or scientific insight. Frequently, problem decomposition
and constraint sequencing follow from critical events, like political decisions, mood
swings in public opinion or changes in important markets. Different framings of
the HIV/AIDS issue in Europe, the US and South Africa illustrate the concepts
introduced in this chapter.
The politics of meaning
A social-constructivist approach
‘What disturbs men’s minds is not events but their judgements on events’, wrote
Epictetus, a Stoic philosopher (c. 55 – c. 135 E.C.), in his Discourses and Manual
(5, trans. Matheson, 1916). This statement is an early precursor of what we now
call a constructivist interpretation of reality (for an overview, see Schwandt,
1994). Most of us would agree that knowing and thinking are not passive. Our
minds do not merely mirror reality but are actively engaged in creating images
of reality.This is amply demonstrated in disciplines as diverse as phenomenology,
humanistic hermeneutics, experimental cognitive psychology and neuroscience.
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The governance of problems
The insight takes on a special meaning for the social sciences, where it is
also acknowledged that experiences of reality are in fact social constructions.
Social actors attribute ‘reality’ to phenomena not only as individual minds and
speakers; but also as exponents of shared systems of intelligibility – written or
spoken language, and images or symbols, mostly. The conventions of language
and its concepts and symbolisms generate a social process of meaning giving or
interpretation. These processes are socially distributed, not of universal validity,
but valid for special, albeit sometimes large, groups or categories of people.
One can hardly underestimate the importance of (social) constructivism in
social science research and theory. In one discipline after another, interpretivism,
symbolic interactionism, linguistics, speech act theory, ethics of communicative
action, discourse analysis, conversation analysis, argumentation theory and the like,
rose to popularity. In feminist theory, for example, the centrality of the concept
of ‘gender’, meaning the social construction of ‘male’ and ‘female’ as distinct from
the anatomical difference, is unthinkable without a social-constructivist approach
(Outshoorn, 1989: 13ff). Much the same can be claimed for the significance of the
gender concept in practical politics and anti-discrimination policy (Mansbridge,
1986).
In political science and the policy sciences, too, social constructivism has become
an important strand of research and theory (for an overview, see Parsons, 1995:
94-109). Anticipating the trend in the early 1960s, French political philosopher
and political scientist Bertrand de Jouvenel (1963:99) formulated as a first axiom
of The pure theory of politics:‘The working of words upon action is the basic political
action’. Pursuing this theme, other authors (Sederberg, 1984; Fischer and Forester,
1993; Hajer, 1995; Stone, 1997; Hoppe, 1999) developed a theory of the politics
of meaning. Politics is conceptualised as an attempt to control shared meaning:
[L]anguage itself is highly unstable and shifting because symbolization
is always incomplete.… The role of the Law [and Public Policy, RH]
is, therefore, to institute meaning by establishing an authoritative ‘no!’
that stops the sliding of meaning. This authoritative no allows for the
creation of sense and viable contexts for human interaction by fixing
meaning. (Catlaw, 2006: 267)
Thus, politics becomes an arena for conflict over the concepts used in framing
political judgements on social problems, public policies, and political leaders and
enemies (Unger, 1987: 10; Edelman, 1988; Rochefort and Cobb, 1994). In the
case of democracies, this conflict is managed by a public debate and structured
communication and interaction between political players. The temporary and
always contestable result is a negotiated definition of meanings shared by a majority
in the polity or the dominant advocacy coalition in a policy domain.
In such a view of politics, public policy making becomes the privilege and
capacity to authoritatively define the nature of shared meanings (Sederberg,
1984: 67) in relevant policy language, texts, objects and artefacts (Yanow, 1999).
60
Analysing policy problems: a problem-structuring approach
It is a never-ending series of communications and strategic moves by which
various policy actors in all kinds of forums of public deliberation and coupled
arenas of policy subsystems construct intersubjective meanings. These meanings
are continually written into the ‘authored documents’ of collective projects and
plans; and in the ‘constructed texts’ (Yanow, 1999) of implementers’ routines and
practices, and the ways ordinary citizens or target populations interpret their
encounters with formal policy actors. All these ways of ‘how policies mean’
(Yanow, 1996), in conjunction with the interpretation of contingencies and
surprises unrelated to policy, may generate the new issues in the next round or
episode of political judgement and meaning constructions; and so on (see Figure
2.4, Chapter Two).
Social and political analysis of public policy problems
Social constructivism gained ascendancy in the sociological analysis of social
problems (Spector and Kitsuse, 1977; Gusfield, 1981). The social constructivist
view in policy and politics also gained much popularity in political science as the
politics of problem definition and agenda setting (Elder and Cobb, 1983; Kingdon,
1984; Baumgartner and Jones, 1993; Rochefort and Cobb, 1994; Cobb and Ross,
1997b; Zahariadis, 2003). Sociologists and political scientists are both interested
in ‘what we choose to identify as public issues and how we think and talk about
these concerns’ (Rochefort and Cobb, 1994). Political scientists, particularly, add
an agenda-setting perspective to this general interest: how to get issues, talked
about in public opinion and public debate, on or off the political and institutional
agendas of political parties and Parliaments; and how to move on to the policy or
decision agendas of, say, departments or other administrative agencies.
The former problem was Schattschneider’s (1960 [1988]) main theme in
his classic work entitled The semi-sovereign people. His basic hypothesis is that
the politics of problem framing is about privatising or expanding the scope of
political conflict. Political parties and interest groups manipulate problem frames
in order to decrease or increase chances for mobilising political support. This
political knowledge interest has dominated much research and writing on the
politics of problem framing to this very day. At first, researchers were interested
in how new issues are framed and put on the agenda successfully by political
strategies for expansion of conflict (Cobb and Elder, 1972). Later they developed
an interest in strategies of agenda denial through problem avoidance, attack or
redefinition (Cobb and Ross, 1997b). Because problem framings are examined
mainly for their (in)capacity to mobilise large audiences for political support, the
connection between problem finding and solving (through institutions, agencies,
or in implementation structures and policy networks) is not a well-articulated
theme in this strand of the literature.
The relation between problem framing, agenda setting and policy development
or design is representative of another branch in the study of political problems:
the development of issue typologies. This type of theorising and research attempts
61
The governance of problems
to connect policy substance to policy process. The basic idea in political science
is Lowi’s (1995 [1972]) famous thesis that policy determines politics, in the sense
that ‘perceived attributes of the policy determine the attributes of the political
process that makes that policy’ (McCool, 1995: 175). Each type of policy creates
and institutionalises its own type of distinct political subsystem and ‘policy politics’
in the political architecture of the whole.
For Lowi, a citizen’s proximity to state coercion is the most important
characteristic of politics. Therefore, his typology focuses on coercive impacts of
policy and policy instruments on citizens and society. In regulative policies (like
rules against fraudulent advertising, or unfair competition), governments have the
highest and immediate coercive impact on citizens’ lives or corporate conduct.
Since regulative policies define the relationship between politics and citizen in
direct hierarchical terms, and because they affect every citizen equally, Lowi
hypothesises that it brings about an open and truly public and pluralist-competitive
kind of politics. This is how the properties of policy define state–society and
state–citizen relations (Stone, 1997: 259-62). Because they also shape political
arenas and types of power relations around issues, policies define types of political
processes or policy politics. Coercive impact is lowest in so-called constituent or
system maintenance policies (like organisational reforms or propaganda on birth
control), because here government coercion is remote, and works only through
changing the environment of individual conduct, not the conduct itself.
Distributive policies (like tariffs and subsidies for particular industries) are of
an in-between type: coercion is low but works directly on individual firms. In
Lowi’s eyes, distributive policies mostly lead to a ‘privatised’, pork barrel, closed
and clientelist or patronage kind of politics. They distribute benefits to small,
well-defined constituencies at public cost.The other in-between type of policy is
redistributive, like progressive income taxes, social security and many other welfare
state programmes. Here coercion is immediate, but pertains to classes of people, not
individuals. These kinds of policies lead to a conflictual kind of politics between
peak associations of business and labour, mobilising groups along lines of class.
Overall, used normatively by political scientists as guardians of democratic quality,
Lowi’s typology suggests a preference for regulatory policies because they lead to
political processes in which interest groups and citizen participation most closely
approximate pluralist democratic ideals.1
Others have also devised typologies using other traits of policies, but with the
same aim of improving democratic governance. For example, Wilson (1989: 7289) devised a typology around the confrontation between government agencies
and interest groups, depending on a policy’s anticipated or perceived pattern of
allocation of benefits and costs. When most or all of a policy’s benefits go to a
small, identifiable interest (business sector, profession, locality), but most or all
costs are borne by all taxpayers, the policy will institutionalise a political arena
where an agency is confronted with one dominant interest group, which favours
its goals in an atmosphere of client politics. Civil aviation regulation before the big
deregulation of the 1980s had this character.The opposite type is an entrepreneurial
62
Analysing policy problems: a problem-structuring approach
politics, in which the implementing agency has to fight a dominant interest group
hostile to its official goals. This type of policy politics is created by a policy that
concentrates costs (on an industry, locality, region or a profession), but spreads
benefits over a large number of people. National highway traffic safety under
the spur of scandals and a clever policy entrepreneur like Ralph Nader is a good
example.
The third case occurs when a policy generates both high per capita concentrated
costs and per capita concentrated benefits, like in occupational health and safety
regulation. Here, the implementing agency can hold its own in a system of interest
group politics, exactly because it is ‘sandwiched’ between rival interest groups strongly
motivated to organise in the conflict over its goals. Finally, Wilson’s typology
acknowledges a political situation of majoritarian politics, where implementing
agencies do not meet overt and permanent opponents or proponents.This occurs
in cases such as national defence, where the policy appears to distribute widely
dispersed benefits and impose widely distributed costs.
Wilson believes that most policies enact clientelist and entrepreneurial
political environments, leading to ‘big government’ and overproduction of
goods and services through the public sector. Paradoxically,Wilson’s political and
administrative science-based issue typology shows the same knowledge interest
as those of political economists and public choice scholars.The latter look at the
public (collective) or private (market) quality of goods and services provided to
citizens (Olson, 1965; Moe, 1980;Weimer and Vining, 1999).Wilson (1989: 369ff)
and the public choice theorists have argued for policies that create markets, or
introduce and institutionalise market-like elements, or at least deregulation in
the public sector.
Neo-positivist and social-constructivist criticism of issue typologies
Issue typologies like Lowi’s and Wilson’s have been criticised on both neo-positivist
and social-constructivist counts. From a neo-positivist position Greenberg et al
(1977) and Smith (2002) have pointed out that issue typologies are hardly testable
due to the complicated nature and theoretical underspecification of concepts like
policy, policy processes, policy contexts and policy outputs or outcomes. One
major problem is the multiplicity of aspects to take into consideration. Does
Wilson take into account all types of a policy’s costs and benefits? Do these costs
and benefits and their pattern of concentration and dispersal not change over
time? In classifying a policy issue, should we give more weight to participants’
(‘subjective’) perceptions or to analysts’ (‘objective’) judgements or measurements?2
And how to deal with the problem of multiple participants with diverging views
on the matter?
Also, using these typologies it turns out that most policies are mixes of more
or less coercive instruments; the dispersed or concentrated character of costs and
benefits is very difficult to establish. Unambiguous classification of existing policies
is near impossible or a very rare case.3 Then, there are problems in specifying the
63
The governance of problems
timeframe for differences between policy intentions and policy outputs or real
impacts on societies, or in specifying relevant interactions between the many
influences or independent variables impinging on stages in policy processes,
outputs and outcomes.4 While Lowi seems to limit the empirical domain of his
typology to the agenda-setting and policy formulation-plus-adoption stages of
policy making, Wilson clearly expands it into the policy implementation stage
and its outcomes.
It has also been pointed out that problem framing is not just political strategy and
tactics, but also has strong institutional traits. Policies may change and bring about a
new politics after radical change during the punctuation period in long-term policy
dynamics (Baumgartner and Jones, 1993). As solutions become institutionalised,
during the long-term equilibrium or incremental policy adaptation normally
following radical change, the type of policy politics also recursively and routinely
recreates particular types of problems. Thus, Lowi’s iconoclastic turnaround of
political science wisdom of the 1960s – not politics determines policy, but policy
determines politics – must be viewed by contemporary insight as an arbitrary
breaking into the causal loop of mutual constitution of politics and policy: ‘as
politics creates policy, policies also remake politics’ (Skocpol, 1992: 58). Or, as
Schneider and Ingram (1997: 6) put it: ‘policy designs are a product of their
historical context, but they also create a subsequent context with its own form
of politics from which the next round of public policy will ensue’.
The most thorough criticism of the issue typology literature actually has come
from a social-constructivist point of view. Steinberger’s basic claim is that the
meaning attributed to a policy is inherently ambiguous; and thus itself becomes
the focus for political struggle:
[Policy controversies] generally involve two (or more) entirely different
and competing understandings and definitions of the very same
policy, of its purpose, its substance and its potential impact.…The
implications are that each policy is likely to have different meanings
for different participants; that the exact meaning of a policy, then, is by
no means self-evident, but, rather, is ambiguous and manipulable; and
that the policy process is – at least in part – a struggle to get one or
another meaning established as the accepted one. (Steinberger, 1980,
in McCool, 1995: 223)
Therefore, a typology of policy issues would have to discover and order what
meanings are relevant to those involved in defining the policy.
To our knowledge, there have been two efforts to apply these suggestions for
new theory building.Anderson (1997) has argued that ‘suasion’ should be included
in the Lowi typology. Suasion denotes language- and communication-based,
manipulatory or educational techniques of governing, or the deliberate creation
of ‘governmentality’. Anderson mentions the genesis of public health policies by
the hygienist movement in the US and Europe as the perfect example. According
64
Analysing policy problems: a problem-structuring approach
to Anderson, suasion fits in the Lowi typology as a milder form of coercion. Lowi
(1997) himself rejected the use of ‘suasion’ as a separate category; if anything,
language, communication, persuasion and education are underlying all other policy
types. Lowi himself might not agree, but this is the typically social-constructivist
and interpretivist response in line with Steinberger’s suggestions.
Schneider and Ingram (1997) advanced a theoretically much more sophisticated
social-constructivist policy-making theory. In their view, policy is made in
processes of social knowledge construction about the identities of target
populations, in contexts of power and institutional relationships. They focus on
two types of contexts that have a socially divisive and therefore degenerative
effect on democratic politics.
In one context, politicians strategically manipulate the social construction of
issues and target populations for political gain. They stereotype a policy’s target
population into ‘deserving’ and ‘undeserving’ groups. In policy designs, they confer
benefits (subsidies, tax breaks, one-stop service provision) on the ‘deserving’, and
burden the ‘undeserving’ with punishments, high costs or neglect. Through the
advocacy of some groups considered as ‘deserving’ (for example the entrepreneurial
middle-class citizen), politicians create a constituency that will re-elect them, and
simultaneously create an image of policy success for a broader political audience.
Through stigmatising other groups as ‘undeserving’ (for example ‘economic’ as
opposed to ‘political’ refugees) or ‘deviants’ (for example drug addicts, young
criminals, potential terrorists), politicians in fact strengthen their positive public
image, but at the price of alienating substantive parts of the citizenry from politics
and democratic participation.
The other policy context is sometimes advocated as the proper antidote to
the former, ‘populist’ way of engaging in politics and policy making. Instead of
exploiting the stereotypes and stigmas in the social construction of knowledge by
the masses, politicians and policy makers should stick to the sober and evidencebased processes of scientific and professional knowledge production for policy.
If politicians see more risks than opportunities in a particular policy issue, and if
science manages to speak with one voice, problem framing, definition and policy
design are left to experts and professionals. However, these ‘technocratic’ policy
contexts also degenerate democratic politics by turning citizens and voters into
passive spectators and mere consumers of programme delivery.
Schneider’s and Ingram’s theory is a real step forward in a social-constructivist
programme of theory development in political science, public administration
and policy science. They correctly emphasise the relatively understudied role
of the social construction of knowledge in contexts of policy design and
formulation. However, their dichotomised picture of populist versus technocratic
political contexts for public policy making is too simplistic. The role of the
social construction of knowledge in policy design and formulation is probably
more complex, rich, multifaceted and diverse. For example, in the literature on
knowledge utilisation (for good overviews, see Weiss, 1980, 1991; Webber, 1992;
Landry et al, 2003; Nutley et al, 2007), a more fine-grained picture of the role of
65
The governance of problems
knowledge in policy analysis and design emerges.This is confirmed if one looks at
work on problem finding and problem solving in such diverse fields as operations
research and systems analysis (Ackoff, 1978; Mason and Mitroff, 1981; Midgley,
2000), design and decision sciences (Kleindorfer et al, 1993; Dorst, 2004), artificial
intelligence (Simon, 1973), policy analysis (Rittel and Webber, 1973; Dery, 1984;
Chisholm, 1995; Dunn, 2007), the social study of science and technology (Hoppe,
2005) and cognitive psychology (Hammond, 1996).
This literature will figure prominently in the next section, which enquires into
the cognitive activities of human beings in their attempts, as problem finders and
solvers, to structure problems. Notions from cognitive psychology and bounded
rationalities are used as a baseline for linking up types of structuring policy
problems to design processes in politically shaped task environments.
The social and political construction of public problems
Problems as social constructions and claims
Let us start from a simple and common-sense definition of the concept of a
‘problem’: one has a problem when one experiences a gap or disparity between
a moral standard and an image of a present or future state of the world. Someone
who claims to be plagued by a problem, implicitly or explicitly passes a moral
judgement. One uses a standard involving value or worthlessness, desirability
or undesirability, to pass judgement on present or expected acts or situations
(e.g. Frankena, 1973; Rokeach, 1973). Some call moral standards strictly
phenomenological, subjective facts of our inner, personal lives (Hodgkinson,
1983: 31-2). Life presents itself to us as a series of moments-facts-events. To
these phenomena we attribute value; it is what we appreciate.Values are, to put
it inelegantly but unambiguously, ‘in ourselves’, not ‘in things out there’. People
attribute or ascribe value to things. In principle, this is a voluntary act.
However, in political or administrative practice, value attribution is part of
social conventions, social status, upbringing and educational background, political
ideology, group interest and, ultimately, expressions of political influence and power
(Safranski, 1999).5 Values are confronted not just as inner feelings with a strictly
private character.They are also confronted as externally imposed constraints, limits
or claims. For example, a public health officer involved in preventing HIV/AIDS
is drawn into difficult political and ethical dilemmas:
Attempts to curtail epidemics raise – in the guise of public health – the
most enduring political dilemma: how to reconcile the individual’s
claim to autonomy and liberty with the community’s concern with
safety? How does the polity treat the patient who is both citizen and
disease carrier? How are individual rights and the public good pursued
simultaneously? (Baldwin, 2005: 3)
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Analysing policy problems: a problem-structuring approach
In this political dilemma, where moral claims for both sides can be traced
to constitutional clauses and public law, policy actors confront the ethical as
objectified social constructions, as group claims and as political power.
Presented as numbers and tables in statistical reports and government documents
written by scientists or officials, problems and problem descriptions sometimes
take on the garb of objective, merely factual statements about a situation. However,
especially public problems are always claims of groups of people about the way
they experience a situation:
[H]aving a problem is a claim on others, on how they ought to think
about our situation and how they ought to act.… I, as an outside
advisor, may claim that a society or an organization has a problem.…
But the problem is posed by me, and unless others feel it or can be
made to feel it, it will not be a problem for them. They may concur
in my definition or choose another one. But my saying that a society
has a problem … is an act that limits the set of possibilities that can
be designated by the members of the society. I have attempted to take
over the problem-defining process, and the society’s politics. (Krieger,
1981: 39-43)
This makes any attempt to frame public problems essentially contested, and thus
part of the political process and political conflict – as Schattschneider (1960
[1988]) taught us so convincingly. What he (and many other political scientists
interested in agenda setting) overlooked in his account of problem finding and
framing, is that understanding the situation and coming to agreement about
it necessarily changes our understandings – sometimes the understanding of
ourselves; not as political manipulation in the strategy and tactics of politics, but
as an unavoidable part of the process of coming to agreement on the nature of
a public issue or problem. In forging agreement on public problems, politicians
create stories of a group’s problem that help them and others, who originally do
not belong to that group, to structure their experiences. They concoct from the
stories of problematic situations experienced by some, a more overarching, more
collective story, capable of mobilising more people behind a problem formulation.
In doing so, the story about the problem changes from the purely local, in some
way contingent story of some group of people, to a more ‘cosmopolitan’ or at least
more decontextualised, and in that sense more ‘rational’ account for a majority.
Transformation of original problem experiences of a particular group of
claimants into a more overarching, collective problem formulation for a political
majority, then, is more than clever political manipulation. It is inherent in
coming to some agreed version of the problematic situation in a democratic way.
Some alienation or distance between individual citizens’ or a particular group’s
problem experience and a politically viable and acceptable problem framing is an
unavoidable socio-cognitive fact of democratic life. It is not necessarily, as many
political scientists have claimed, self- or group-interest-driven ‘bias’. In principle,
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The governance of problems
this cognitive dimension is independent from processes of political representation
and aggregation.The transformation of a problem formulation, and the subsequent
distance or potential alienation felt by some of the original problem owners,
would also occur under the most participatory and deliberative forms of politics
and collective decision making.
Let us now shift from the normative to the factual or empirical aspect in
problematisation.The fact–value distinction is still frequently justified by invoking
the idea that the world of ‘values’ is created by our own fiat, whereas the world
of ‘facts’ is an indubitable, external given . But epistemologists meanwhile agree
that the idea of immediately ‘given’ sense data as rock-bottom baseline for human
knowledge is a misconception. Every form of human observation and every
‘fact’ discovered through observation, is inevitably coloured or pre-structured
by frequently implicit, hidden theoretical notions (Diesing, 1991; Ziman, 2000).
Thus, in an indelible way, events and situations that we ‘see’ and ‘experience’ are
influenced by concepts and mindframes acquired in the course of our life. In the
political, administrative and policy sciences, such insights have generated a flood
of research into the ontological, causal and finalistic (means–goals) assumptions
in policy paradigms, heuristics, mindframes, cognitive maps, cultural scripts and
the like (Hoppe, 1999; Fischer, 2003).
Although we should relativise the fact–value distinction from an epistemological
point of view, we cannot do away with it in practice.When we justify our values,
we do appeal to the consent of others in terms of arguments of ‘goodness’ or
‘justice’ or ‘utility’. When we make claims about facts, we appeal to the consent
of others in terms of ‘truth’, ‘verisimilitude’ and ‘honesty’. On top of that, in spite
of many differences, there exists a fair amount of agreement on the rationality of
procedures and methods for convincing an academic or professional community
of experts on the truth-value of individual propositions and theories. Similar
methods or procedures for arguing the superiority of ethical claims or theories,
like in ethics, theology and law, are more contested (Fischer, 1980; Dunn, 1983).
More importantly, however suspect the fact–value distinction has become
from an epistemological point of view, it is historically entrenched in many
institutions of modernity. Particularly, the boundaries between the institutions
of science and politics, and between politics and administration, have exactly
the fact–value distinction as one of their pillars. In the practical boundary work
between representatives of these institutional spheres, the fact–value distinction is
continuously appealed to as a basis for demarcation and coordination of activities
(Jasanoff, 1990; Halffman, 2003). For example, people working for independent
think tanks and policy analysts working in state bureaucracies both refer to
science as being experimental, empirical, independent, certified, measured, reliable,
consistent, careful, meticulous, peer reviewed, published, factual and so on; whereas
policy and politics are labelled as a matter of values, decisions, implementation of
political decisions, choice, wisdom, practical knowledge, management and so on.
Ezrahi (1990) has convincingly argued that methods of ‘objective’ science were
complementary to – and actually strengthened – the depersonalised authority of
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Analysing policy problems: a problem-structuring approach
democratically elected political leaders and bureaucratically organised civil servants.
In other words, the fact–value distinction may be epistemologically suspect and
contested; in political, administrative and scientific practice the boundary line is
continuously constructed on the basis of the fact–value organisation of activities,
tasks, projects, policy programmes and the like. This does not mean that the
boundary is clear, pre-given and conflict free. On the contrary, boundary work
entails almost day-to-day negotiations between representatives of the different
institutional spheres to draw the line situationally and contingently (Halffman,
2003). The point is that, in doing so, policy-relevant actors appeal to fact–valueladen institutional narratives. ‘Bureaucracy’ is shorthand for the front-office
narrative that bureaucrats serve and obey democratically accountable politicians,
and everything entailed in the division of labour between instrumental and
substantive rationality in day-to-day policy work. ‘Decisionism’ conveys a similar
narrative that truth-telling science bows to the primacy of value-proclaiming
politics. Put more precisely, in the back-office negotiations and consultative
mutual cooperation of their day-to-day boundary work, civil servants and experts
act ‘in the shadow’ of institutional rules of bureaucracy and decisionism (Hoppe
and Huijs, 2003).
This is exactly the reason why, as a first step in following Steinberger’s (1995
[1980]) suggestions, the fact–value distinction provides the analyst with two
socially and politically grounded dimensions for a typology of policy problems.
Every effort to pin down a problem is a double social construct. And this is
not all. In problem framing and definition, fact-constructions are linked to
norm-constructions through comparison; and this comparison is also a social
construction in itself. Here too, the comparison, in political or administrative
practice, is not just an individual act of free will. Politicians, administrators, and
policy and science advisers cannot just arbitrarily compare values and facts and
on that basis attribute the label ‘problem’ to the judgement that the facts of a
situation do not meet some standard. In order to do this successfully, they have
to take into account the distribution of agreement and disagreement and power
relations in different forums (see Watzlawick et al, 1974):
• the degree of consent on (prognosticated) facts in all kinds of political,
administrative and scientific or professional forums, the media and public
opinion;
• the degree of consent on values at stake;
• the degree of consent on the problem formulation itself, that is, the comparison
of fact- and value-sets.
For example, in Amsterdam city government during the latter half of the 1980s,
the norm of equal treatment irrespective of gender, and facts about preferential
treatment for women, were linked as a goal to a means. In the political climate
of those days, there was strong agreement on the factual need and normative
desirability of this instrumental link. Whoever would politically criticise this
69
The governance of problems
construction between a value and a fact as in reality ineffective, or as an unjustified
gap between the practice of a policy programme and an ethical standard of nondiscrimination, would not only fight a lost political cause; even the courts would
rule against them.
In summary, the elegant simplicity of the concept of a ‘problem’ as a gap between
a moral or ethical standard and some existing or expected situation cannot conceal
its deeply problematic structure. Anyone formulating a problem constructs an
easily contestable connection between ontologically disparate elements: moral
standards or ethical guidelines (norms, values, principles, ideals), on the one hand,
and facts, ‘data’ or empirical elements, on the other. Straddling the fact–value
distinction, the concept of a ‘problem’ expresses the inextricable entwining of
fact-values or value-facts in politics and administrative practice (Forester, 1989:
240-1). Exacerbating the epistemological hybridity of the concept, one should add
the second property of public policy problems: they are social constructs in every
respect.Thus, when a politician or policy maker, on behalf of some authoritative
political institution or public agency, formulates a problem, and this formulation
gets accepted by a majority, a very complex and delicate social ‘composition’ has
been created. It is both complex and delicate because as a political and social
fabric it may be torn apart in three ways:
• the social construction of the facts may be denied, or judged to be incomplete,
biased, misleading or even a set of outright lies, and so forth;
• the social construction of values may be judged as incomplete, one-sided,
wrong or unjust in principle, and so on;
• the comparative link between facts and values may be rejected as illogical,
irrelevant, not plausible, nonsensical, and so on.
At the same time, having contributed to the bringing about of such a delicate
fabric as a politically accepted problem definition, why should one be modest
about one’s achievement? And why not resist any effort at deconstruction and
reframing as wrong-headed, even malicious? After all, the universal and rational
notion of problem processing claims that problem-solving efforts require stable
problem definitions lest they become ‘moving targets’.
Four types of policy problems
The simple definition of a ‘problem’ hides a complex social construction. In this
section, the heuristically productive and theoretically plausible reduction of that
complexity for purposes of political judgement, policy analysis and policy design is
at stake. It means that one should be able to distinguish between types of problems
in the public sector. What is needed is a typology of policy problems, as a kind
of model of the task environments that politicians and other policy makers face
in the analysis, design and evaluation of public policies. But first we need some
70
Analysing policy problems: a problem-structuring approach
minimal assumptions about the problem-processing behaviour of politicians and
proximate policy makers (see Dorst, 2004).
Like all human beings, politicians and proximate policy makers are cognitive
misers – perhaps even more so than other people, due to the information overload
of the hypercomplex social-institutional contexts in which they usually operate.
In their task environments, they have good reasons to want maximum intellectual
results from minimal cognitive efforts. For them, processing problem claims in
a more or less rational way involves three distinct, but connected demands (see
Gigerenzer et al, 1999):
• Bounded rationality (Simon, 1947, 1957): dealing with problems – from
experiencing a problematic situation, to problem framing and defining, through
to applying search-and-stop rules for alternative creation and selection, or
problem solving – is intendedly, but boundedly rational. As an informationprocessing system, the human brain runs into cognitive limits determined
by our neurophysiologic make-up, like the processing capacity of short- and
long-term memory.The human capacity for information processing is less than
fully adapted to the complexity of our environment. Dealing rationally with
problems should make realistic demands on time, speed and computational
skills of ordinary people. The implication is that human beings, politicians
and policy makers among them, unavoidably use strategies and heuristics of
complexity reduction. Practically, it means that that there will always be a
tension between analysis and intuition; analysis as a ‘step-by-step, conscious,
logically defensible (cognitive) process’, and more intuitive ways of problem
coping that somehow produce a solution, but through unarticulated, tacit
ways, without the transparency and consistency of more analytic methods
(Hammond, 1996: 60ff).
• Ecological rationality (Hammond, 1996: 111ff; Goldstein and Hogarth, 1997):
rational problem processing is always a performance in a real-world environment
or task environment. From an evolutionary point of view, the human capacity
to survive and adapt to changing environments implies that rationality works
successfully only through some kind of correspondence between the inner
and outer life-world. Like many other animals, humans use multiple fallible
indicators to judge this correspondence between problem-processing efforts and
the task environment. Monitoring policy fields by elaborate sets of economic,
social, cultural and ecological indicators, of course, is a well-known device for
policy makers (e.g. MacRae, 1985; MacRae and Whittington, 1997). Practically,
ecological rationality introduces a tension between generality and specificity,
the cosmopolitan and the local, situational, or contextual elements in problem
processing.
• Social rationality (Janis and Mann, 1977; Tetlock, 1997): this is a special form
of ecological rationality, as people making claims on other people (see above)
socially construct most of a human problem-processing context. Psychologist
Philip E. Tetlock (1997: 660-1) gives an excellent description of the socially
71
The governance of problems
constructed task environment of political and public life in his two core
assumptions on humans as ‘would-be’ politicians: (a) ‘accountability of conduct
as a universal feature of the natural decision environment’, as the most important
link between individual policy makers and the social-political environments
in which they typically act; and (b) people act as approval-and-status seekers,
keen on protecting and enhancing their self-esteem, social image and identity,
while acquiring power and wealth. Practically, these assumptions give rise
to two interdependent tensions. First, a tension between a correspondence
theory of truth, based on criteria of accuracy in representing a ‘real-life’ world;
and coherence theories of truth based on criteria of logical and attitudinal
consistency with prior beliefs and positions (Hammond, 1996). Second,
a tension between judgements arrived at through one’s personal feelings,
intuitions, observations and analyses; and judgements generated by social
pressures or instigation by others-as-group-members (Hoppe, 1983). The deideologisation and individualisation processes in coming to political judgement,
discussed in Chapter Two, clearly exacerbate both. Individualisation of political
judgement erodes trust of socially instigated judgements; de-ideologisation
attributes a less prominent place to a coherence theory of political truth,
and boosts a correspondence theory of political truth. The rising number of
performance indicators and league tables in policy making evidences the trend.
Acting boundedly, ecologically, and socially rational, policy actors will be prone
to use an acceptability heuristic (Tetlock, 1997; confirming Braybrooke and
Lindblom, 1963): in accounting for their decisions they will first and foremost look
at acceptability in the eyes of those who have to support, represent or otherwise
publicly cover them. Projecting this on the dimensions of accountability for the
framing and definition of public problems, policy makers and politicians confront
different potential situations.
Regarding moral or ethical standards, they will distinguish between policy
problems whose standards, norms, values and objectives are more or less agreed
to. Similarly, concerning perceptions of present and future situations or conditions,
and the deliberate transformation of problematic present into improved future,
they will distinguish between policy problems in which there is more or less
certainty on available and usable knowledge. Using these two dimensions – degree
of agreement on normative claims at stake, degree of certainty on relevant and
available knowledge – one may construct the following typology of the sociocognitive status of problems for policy makers in political task environments (see
Figure 3.1).6
The heart of the typology is the opposed pair of structured versus unstructured
problems. One can speak of structured problems, when policy designers perceive
unanimity or near consensus on the normative issues at stake, and are very certain
about the validity and applicability of claims to relevant knowledge.They simply
know how to turn a problematic present situation into the improved, or desirable,
unproblematic future situation. A structured problem is like a puzzle. However
72
Analysing policy problems: a problem-structuring approach
Figure 3.1: Four types of problem structures
Far from
certainty on
required and
available
knowledge
Close to
certainty ...
Unstructured
problems
Moderately
structured problems
(goals)
Moderately
structured problems
(means)
Structured
problems
Far from
agreement ...
Close to agreement on
norms and values at stake
complex, the pieces of the puzzle are given, and for each puzzle there is just one
configuration of pieces representing an adequate solution (Mason and Mitroff,
1981; Dery, 1984). There exists a solution for the problem that, for all practical
purposes, is complete and fully guaranteed; usually by means of standardised
methods of applied science or professional practice. Rittel and Webber (1973)
give as examples ‘domesticated’ problems of low complexity from the early days
of statehood, like building and paving roads, designing and building housing (but
see Simon, 1973), eradicating dread diseases (but see Baldwin, 2005) and providing
clean water and sanitary sewers. Many, not all7, problems of a medical nature fall
into this category. Scientific, technical, evidence-based treatment and therapy make
for high levels of certainty on relevant knowledge. Also, there appears to be near
unanimous consent on the goals of medicine: prevention of disease and injury,
promotion and maintenance of good health, relief of pain and suffering caused
by maladies, care and cure of the sick, care for those who cannot be cured, and
avoidance of premature death and pursuit of peaceful death (Callahan, 2003: 8892). It is because of these two properties that the problem definition of structured
problems can be kept out of the sphere of subjectivity, politics and overt interest
struggle (De Jouvenel, 1963: 206-7).Thus, structured problems are usually matters
of administrative implementation and professional routine.
One may speak of unstructured problems when policy makers observe widespread
discomfort with the status quo, yet perceive persistent high uncertainty about
relevant knowledge claims, and high preference volatility in mass and elite opinion,
or strong, divisive, even community-threatening conflict over the values at stake.
Rittel and Webber call such unstructured problems ‘wicked’,8 because any solution
effort immediately spawns new dissent and more intense conflict. Unstructured
problems are difficult to disentangle ‘webs’ of interrelated problems; they resist
decomposition in (quasi)independent clusters of problems. There is dissent and
conflict over which pieces belong to the ‘puzzle’, and over which arrangement
of the pieces means ‘solving’ the puzzle. In the risk societies of late modernity,
where the distribution of risks has succeeded the welfare state’s distribution of
73
The governance of problems
goods as the focus of public debate (Beck, 1992), the volume and intensity of
unstructured problems appear to be on the rise. Sometimes the negative side
effects of entrenched technologies cause a U-turn from structured to unstructured
problem. Issues like the car mobility problem (Hendriks, 1999; Hoppe and Grin,
2000), the building of nuclear power plants in the Netherlands in the 1980s
(Hisschemöller, 1993: 71-8), contemporary planning for a nuclear phase-out in
Belgium (Laes et al, 2004) and anthropogenic global warming (Peterse, 2006)
belong in this category. Sometimes it is the unbridled research and innovation
drive, which leads to new, unstructured problems. This may manifest itself in
new medical technologies like (therapeutic) cloning and xenotransplantation
or breakthroughs in preventive screening by genomics (Callahan, 2003; Hoppe,
2008a). Contrary to structured problems, unstructured problems occasionally are
in the political spotlight, and may even generate sustained, intractable political
controversies (Schön and Rein, 1994).
Moderately structured problems (ends) occur when policy makers observe a great
deal of agreement on the norms, principles, ends and goals of defining a desirable
future state; but simultaneously considerable levels of uncertainty about the
relevance and/or reliability of knowledge claims about how to bring it about.
This kind of problem typically leads to disputes over what kind of research
might deliver more certain knowledge for solving the problem. Given uncertain
knowledge, and thus uncertain effectiveness and efficiency of interventions,
moderately structured problems (ends) also frequently raise issues of bargaining
about who will be responsible for expenditures in financing or otherwise enabling
certain interventions; and for risks in the case of ineffectiveness or negative side
effects. Issues like traffic safety (Hoppe and Grin, 2000), ambient particulate
matter (Peterse, 2006), fighting obesity and many issues of policies for routinely
agreed-upon socio-economic goals like maximising Gross Domestic Product and
minimising inflation (Halffman and Hoppe, 2005) belong to this problem type.
Moderately structured problems (means) exist when relevant and required knowledge
leads to high levels of certainty, but there is ongoing dissent over the normative
claims at stake. The key characteristic of this type of policy problem is not
knowledge certainty, but the valuative ambiguity, and frequently the contested
and divisive nature of the ethics of the problem. The Dutch debate on abortion
provides an excellent example. When the issue arrived at the political agenda, a
new, fully safe abortion technique had been introduced.The early debate focused
on the in-principle moral permissibility of abortion; later phases concentrated on
the conditions under which abortion might be permissible; and on alternative
procedures of consultation for establishing such conditions (Outshoorn, 1986).
In US political and policy studies, the concept of ‘morality policy’ (Mooney,
1999; Smith, 2002) or even ‘sin policy’ (Meier, 1999) has been coined to cover a
cluster of moderately structured (means) problems that are generally high on the
conservative political agenda, and characterised by an emphasis on fundamental
notions of right and wrong, high political salience and low information costs.
Abortion, euthanasia or physician-assisted suicide, racism and anti-discrimination
74
Analysing policy problems: a problem-structuring approach
policies in general, same-sex marriage, capital punishment, gun control, smoking,
family and (criminal) youth policy would all belong to this class of problem
constructions.
In spite of the illustrations given for clarity’s sake, the four problem types are
ideal types in the Weberian sense: simplifying and to some extent screening out
some problem properties in order to bring other aspects (in this case, cognitive
and design facets in a political task environment) into sharper relief. For one
thing, the typology’s dimensions are not inherently dichotomous; consequently,
not every policy problem will be unambiguously classifiable as one of the four
types. In real-life cases, one encounters hybrid pairings, as will become clear from
later examples and case narratives. For another, it will frequently be the case that
different policy actors will classify the ‘same’ problematic situation differently;
and even for the same policy actor, problem types are stable only for certain
periods of time. In the next section, it will become clear how to deal with these
familiar analytic problems of multiple policy actors and the temporality and
transformation of problem frames. Here only the heuristic value of the typology
is claimed for the analysis of politically authoritative policy design – be it from a
formally political, bureaucratic or scientific position. Given the assumptions about
the bounded, ecological and social rationality of politicians and policy makers,
we cannot expect them to define problems ‘objectively’. Policy problems are by
definition socio-political constructs and presuppose political (inter)subjectivity.
However, this subjectivity does not operate randomly. People may display certain
judgemental and behavioural patterns in defining problems. (Chapter Four will
treat this hypothesis in depth from a cultural perspective, Chapter Five from the
angle of types of policy networks and policy-making processes.)
From the basic assumptions the expectation is derived that governmental
policy makers and decision makers prefer to define ‘their’ problems as structured.
Doing so minimises their uncertainty, limits the need for search activities and
constrains the range of alternative solutions to existing repertoires. Furthermore,
it is hypothesised that when there is too much complexity or social conflict,
they will continue trying to minimise ‘trouble’. Therefore, they will prefer to
identify these politically more sensitive situations as one of the two classes of
moderately structured problems.They would rather not admit to themselves and
others that they have fully unstructured problems on their hands.This implies that
governmental policy makers will show a marked tendency to ignore, sometimes
to actively screen out, information that may complicate the policy problem under
scrutiny. This tendency need not be deliberate, or even acknowledged. Policy
makers may be completely unaware of their screening relevant information away
from the policy arena since they may not consciously grasp the biases that are
inherent in their own belief systems and policy frames (see Chapter Four).
Another reason for problem-framing bias or sheer neglect is that policy makers
when finding and choosing a problem frame immediately find themselves bound
by a ‘legitimate’ problem space and a political discourse to discuss it.That is, they
determine what can, cannot, may and may not be said about the problem without
75
The governance of problems
being labelled as transgressing politically ‘correct’ boundaries or rules of the
political language game. In respecting rules of political correctness, they implicitly
decide on which values are at stake and pre-structure which (type of) knowledge
is relevant and required for problem solving. In the case of gaps between problem
understanding by official policy makers and other influential proximate policy
makers and stakeholders or the public at large, they run the risk of tackling what
is called the ‘wrong problem’.They may treat as ‘structured’ a problem that other
stakeholders – be they peak associations, pressure groups, target populations, or
even their own executive managers and street-level bureaucrats – experience and
define as much more complex and controversial than they are willing to admit.
It is exactly at this point where, if they go unacknowledged, unattended to or
denied for too long, intractable policy struggles occur.
But before taking up these points, the distinction between structured and
unstructured problems is to be elaborated. For a full understanding of the nature
and function of the problem typology, the question of how problems acquire
some sort of structure should be dealt with.
On structuring unstructured problems
Properties of structured and unstructured problems
Think of a textbook-level mathematical problem, or a typical chess problem in
your daily newspaper – white moves and checkmates in four.These are examples
of structured problems. Not all structured problems are trite and simple. Some
structured problems are extremely complex, like offshore oil drilling or putting
a man on the moon. The point is that structured problems have a track record
of ‘doability’.We know for sure that a feasible, well-understood method, strategy,
mostly an algorithm, exists that satisfies all criteria for an adequate, successful
solution. In a sense, the problem has become non-existent now that its solution
is known and available to all who care to learn the ‘trick’.
On a somewhat higher level of sophistication, we may think of problems of
disorganised or organised technical and social complexity as continuously solved by
experts or professionals who have routinised or black-boxed scientific discoveries
and methods (Schön, 1983). Those experts are for hire for those with sufficient
resources, who can thus make experts’ knowledge work for their purposes. In a
sense, relatively well-structured problems are the basis of the intricate divisions of
labour between occupations in our industrial, service and knowledge economies.
Large-scale functional organisations in business, the public sector and civil society
are considered to be the repositories of the knowledge and skills to solve all kinds
of structured problems (Chisholm, 1995). Contemporary ideas about governance
are about ‘weaving’ ever-different webs or networking arrangements between such
organisations by linking up their standard operating procedures in order to solve
ever-changing societal problems. Note the implicit assumption in this type of
76
Analysing policy problems: a problem-structuring approach
administrative thinking: most ‘new’ problems are solvable through innovative mixes
of and tinkering with existing (partial) solutions or standard operating procedures.
This explains the attractiveness of solutions to supposedly well-structured
problems to politicians and policy makers. Even if they realise that most politically
salient problems are not quite fully structured, they would want to move problems
into the quadrant of structured problems rather sooner than later (Schön, 1983;
March and Simon, 1993 [1958]).The problem with this idealised image of scientific
and professional problem solving is that between structured and unstructured
problems there is the huge class of moderately structured problems. For these kinds
of problems it is not or not yet clear whether they will make it from unstructured
to structured. For many public policy problems, one has to acknowledge that
the understanding of the causes of social ills for which improvement is sought is
weak, as is knowledge about the effectiveness, efficiency and possible side effects
of available or new policy instruments. In addition, improvement of a problematic
situation may mean very different things to different people. Sometimes even
one group’s improvement of the situation is another group’s loss. There is more
than a kernel of truth in the idea that government and public administration are
a receptacle or ‘garbage can’ for problems that private-sector or civil-society types
of organisations consider as unsolvable, or too risky to try.
The transformation of an unstructured into a structured problem has been
conceptualised as a process of closing open constraints. Constraints refer to any
or all elements that go into the definition of a problem; they are either ‘given’
and ‘closed’, or ‘open’ and amenable to choice.To mention only some of the most
salient ones in ideal-typical form (complete lists in Simon, 1973: 183; Mason and
Mitroff, 1981: 10-11) see Table 3.1.
Table 3.1: Structured versus unstructured problems
Structured problem
Unstructured problem
Testability
Definite criteria for testing proposed
solutions; errors can be clearly
pinpointed.
No single criteria system or solution
rule exists; solutions are better or
worse relative to one another.
Explanation
Clear explanation for gaps between
‘is’ and ‘ought’; all knowledge is
accurate and codified.
Many possible explanations for
for same discrepancy; different
explanations fit different solutions; not
all knowledge articulable.
Tractability
One well-representable problem
Ambiguous and uncertain problem
space, with exhaustive list of
spaces; exhaustive, enumerable list of
imaginable and permissible operations permissible operations not possible.
to transform initial state, through
intermediate, to goal states.
Finality
Clear solution and ending point;
closure possible and observable.
No stopping rules (apart from
practicable amounts of time for
search and information processing);
permanent vigilance required.
Reproducability and Can be made to repeat itself many
Essentially one-shot operation;
replicability
times; trial and error under controlled limited possibilities for trial-and-error
conditions possible.
learning.
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The governance of problems
Yet, as argued above, in real-life situations, constraints on the definition of
problems and problem spaces are elusive, and socially and historically constructed.
Simon (1973) himself already relativised the distinction by showing that any
so-called structured problem (chess, designing a house, ship building) can be
deconstructed as, stripped to its essentials, unstructured. Problems presenting
themselves to problem solvers in the real world are best considered ‘ill-structured’;
‘well-structured’ problems actually are ‘ill-structured’ problems formalised for and
codified by previous problem solvers (Simon, 1973: 186).9
Simon went on to show how unstructured problems acquire their structure
in the ways in which designers, using their personal, professional, organisational
or institutional long-term memories during design processes, decompose an
unstructured problem-in-the-large into more and more structured partial
problems-in-the-small. Given the historical and serial nature of problem
processing, the sequence of bringing constraints to bear on a problem in large part
determines the properties of the problem definition; and hence its influence on
the delineation of a problem space for generating and testing alternatives, and
eventually, the choice of a solution (Chisholm, 1995: 478).
The historical and serial nature of problem processing brings out another
property of moderately or under-structured problems. In rational, front-office
accounts of problem solving where designers explain or justify what they
have done and why they have done it to principals or other outsiders, they
treat problems as structured: they formulate and describe the nature of the
problem first; they present alternatives generated and solutions chosen later.
More importantly, problem description and solution are presented as separate
and logically independent. Put differently, the hallmark of rationality is that the
solution fits the problem – and not the other way round. However, in the case of
moderately structured or unstructured problems, any formulation and description
of ‘the problem’ is implicitly or explicitly dependent on some accepted solution.
Rationality and rationalising become blurred. The problem fits the solution – and
not the other way round: ‘problem understanding and problem resolution are
concomitant to each other … the problem can’t be defined until the solution has
been found’ (Rittel and Webber, 1973: 161; compare Mason and Mitroff, 1981:
10; and March and Olsen, 1976: 26-7). In other words, rather than speaking of
problems and solutions separately, in case of moderately and unstructured problems
we should be speaking about problem-solution couplings.
This is even more true if we realise that, in politics and administration,
problem decomposition and constraint sequencing are not merely or even
mainly professional issues. Frequently, they follow from critical moments in
political decision making, mood swings in public opinion or developments in
relevant markets. The critical incident model depicted in Figure 3.2 is a good
account of how problem decomposition and constraint sequencing in politics
and administration result in temporary spaces or niches where authoritative or
dominant problem definitions flourish – until critical incidents intervene and a
new dominant problem definition emerges.
78
Analysing policy problems: a problem-structuring approach
Figure 3.2: How dominant problem definitions come about and change
Policy
players’
strategies
Critical
events
(powering)
Dominant
problem
definition
Mutual
partisan
adjustment
Problem
framings
(temporarily)
stable
niche
Progess in
implementers’
professional/
academic insight
(puzzling)
Source: Adapted from Vergragt (1988)
The model posits the presence of several policy players with different strategies
and framings of the problematic situation. Through persuasion, bargaining and
others types of partisan mutual adjustment they attempt to gain authoritative
acceptance for their claims.This usually results in one problem framing becoming
the hegemonic or dominant problem definition.The dominant problem definition
creates a niche, that is, a more or less stable constellation of constraints on problemsolving efforts.This means that policy implementers may puzzle about alternative
solution ideas within the bounds of the set of constraints; and professional or
academic evaluators make all kinds of discoveries about the pros and cons of the
constraints implied by the dominant problem definition.These learning processes
or important external political events may or may not have anything to do with
the policy concerned (hence the dotted double arrow running from the niche box
to the critical event box as powering in Figure 3.2). They may lead up to novel
critical moments or events that may lift (some) older constraints or introduce
new ones.The historical sequence of such processes creates path dependencies in
problem definitions or constraint sequencing. Such path dependencies themselves
constitute a kind of meta-constraint in the sense that they either facilitate or work
against the adoption of novel problem-solution couplings.
An illustration: coping with AIDS
The difference between structured, moderately structured and unstructured
problems in real life can perhaps be grasped best from the way scientists construct
‘doable’ problems by way of controlled experimentation (Fujimura, 1987).
79
The governance of problems
A problem is considered structured when, however complex, the chances of
successfully solving it through methods of experimental laboratory and applied
research are judged plausible (see also Hammond, 1996: 233-93). In this sense,
all contributors to the AIDS special issue of Scientific American in October 1987
considered the AIDS epidemic a structured problem:
To sum up, AIDS is a scientific research problem, to be solved only
by basic investigation in good laboratories. The research done in the
past few years has been elegant and highly productive, with results that
tell us one sure thing: AIDS is a soluble problem, albeit an especially
complex and difficult one. (Gallo and Montagnier, 1988: 31)
To them the retrovirus called human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) was the one
and only cause of AIDS. Thus, public debate on the goals of AIDS policy was
meaningless.The goal then was to cure AIDS and prevent its dissemination.This
required generous research funding.
If scientific methods are judged less applicable, either in principle, or in practice,
the less structured the problem. In principle, such methods fall short10 in cases
where the problem is due to controversies on the moral standards to be used in
judging ‘improvement’ of the problematic situation. Sometimes objections to
scientific methods are more practical, yet decisive. There may be good reasons
not to subject human or animal subjects to rigorous scientific experiments.
Alternatively, the problem may turn out to be trans-scientific (Weinberg, 1972).
It may well lend itself to scientific formulation and method, but the number
of statistically required research subjects is unmanageably large; or the duration
and costs of experimentation are prohibitive. In the late 1980s, some feared that
trans-scientific constraints might seriously hamper progress in finding a curative
or preventive vaccine against the cause of AIDS – HIV:
Yet AIDS vaccine researchers are still working in the dark compared
with their predecessors at least in one respect: (1) they have no good
animal model for the disease.… In the meantime, there is no way to
establish criteria for the efficacy of (vaccines) before injecting them
in humans.… (2) Clinicians also expect to be confronted with a
shortage of trial volunteers…. (3) … Leaders of corporate research …
have warned that the uncertainty surrounding the risks of vaccinerelated injuries and compensation for them could ultimately hinder
development. (Matthews and Bolognesi, 1988: 105)
These fears would lead to classification of the AIDS problem as moderately
structured (ends). Strong research funding was still seen to be a necessary part of
the solution. But, depending on one’s estimate of the pace of scientific progress,
either an individualist, voluntaristic public health policy aimed at changing risky
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Analysing policy problems: a problem-structuring approach
behaviour, or a control-and-containment strategy for breaking transmission routes,
were deemed necessary complementary routes to a solution.
Surprisingly perhaps, there were some who defined the AIDS problem as
moderately structured (means), thus stressing its ethical and normative side. So-called
AIDS dissidents or denialists, South-African President Thabo Mbeki being the
best known and politically most influential, framed the problem in this mode. In
a pragmatic guise, this problem definition saw HIV as one among many social
cofactors like poverty, malnutrition, bad sanitation and other environmental risk
factors. It was certainly not necessarily the most important or sufficient cause of
the AIDS epidemic. In its purest form, it
sprang from a long-standing belief in disease as a sign of imbalance
between humans and nature, a cosmic and moral indication that things
were out of joint.… [T]he fight against AIDS [is] seen as inseparable
from a major reform of the status quo. In a world without AIDS, all
people would be taught about sexuality, drugs, and health; all drug
addicts would be treated; everyone would have access to basic health
care; no one would maltreat gays or ethnic minorities; and there would
be no homeless. (Baldwin, 2005: 22, 24; compare Douglas, 1996a)
Testimony to the interpretive plurality of any particular issue, one US sociologist
and policy analyst went on record in 1988 arguing that, from a policy or
administrative perspective, the AIDS issue is in fact unstructured:
[G]enerating policies for AIDS is at best a vague and general activity,
one that comes hard against the granite wall of constitutional law no
less than medical and chemical inadequacies.… For the moment, and
many moments to come, there is very little agreement on the need for
information, hardly any consensus on the implications of the medical
aspects of the AIDS issues, and virtually no agreement on the moral
basis of behavior.… In the meantime, the demand for policy serves to
exacerbate rather than alleviate partisan concerns. (Irving Horowitz,
1988: 57, 63)
Although clearly overstating the case, from the point of view of policy analysis and
policy design it may be useful to consider a public issue or policy problem ‘from
scratch’, so to say. It means taking seriously the possibility of deconstructing any
politically adopted problem definition into an unstructured problem – as Simon
(1973) actually demonstrated in discussing the ‘structure’ of ill-structured problems.
In a carefully written historical and comparative analysis of how democratic
Western states dealt with the HIV/AIDS problem, Baldwin (2005) shows in detail
how and why different sets of policy actors chose different problem definitions
and different solutions. Baldwin provides valuable insights into how problem
structuring works – both in the large and the small, and in the short and the
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The governance of problems
long term. He shows why problem claims processing actors with standing at
the public policy table who face seemingly identical challenges may end up
with quite different problem-solution couplings. More precisely, Baldwin traces
dissimilar problem framings and definitions to differences in the implicit or explicit
organisation or ‘infrastructure’ of their problem decomposition, and differences in
the sequencing of constraints on overall problem solutions (Chisholm, 1995: 477).
In all democratic Western states, there was a more or less identical social and
political cast of actors involved in framing the AIDS problem – first, politicians
and governmental officials and policy analysts; second, the (public) health
professionals, with medical researchers as an important sub-community; third,
the public at large; and among them, fourth, social categories, interest groups,
or target populations holding special stakes. In the US, for example, such special
groups were labelled the four ‘H group’ of Haitians, hookers, heroin addicts and
haemophiliacs. Although governing politicians and their policy staffs were in the
political lead, they were primarily looking at the health professionals for feasible
and acceptable problem framings.
Basically, health professionals advocated two alternative framings of the issue.
Like all professional problem solving, their typical way of structuring the AIDS
problem was to break it down into relatively independent sub-problems. The
AIDS problem was essentially broken down into three sub-problems: finding a
cure, caring for the already infected and preventing the still healthy from being
infected. Depending in part on group bias and in part on public debate, health
professionals arrived at different beliefs on how much progress could be made,
how fast and at what cost. With no cure on the horizon, prevention would be
the only effective collective public health approach to controlling a potential AIDS
epidemic. As a solution strategy this meant falling back on well-known controland-containment strategies against transmissible diseases and potential epidemics,
dating back as far as the early 19th century. The collective approach to public
health was informed by contagionist beliefs, which focused on excluding the
infectious, banning transmissive human behaviour, and sanitationist engineering
of large parts of the human environment. It required a top-down approach that
subjugated individual interests to those of the collective. Policy instruments
involved identification and reporting of sero-positives, contact screening, isolation
and quarantining, and enforcement of legal sanctions against those unwilling to
comply.Although not widely practised anymore in the 1980s, the collectivist policy
approach was frequently still inscribed into public health law and organisational
routine; and in that sense it was still in the toolkit of public health officials and
health professionals.
However, medical research scientists (quoted above) and other public health
professionals, originally supported by civil libertarians and gay activists, favoured
an individualised public health policy frame. This approach was ushered in by the
bacteriological paradigm shift that rocked the medical world in the late 19th and
early 20th centuries. The individualised approach located the cause of diseases
in micro-organisms, thereby ethically ‘neutralising’ disease carriers. It focused on
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Analysing policy problems: a problem-structuring approach
the education and persuasion of people to adopt a scientifically informed kind of
personal hygiene. In this view, an individualist governmentality and voluntaristic
approach to the AIDS epidemic were advocated: let science quickly develop a
preventive or curative vaccine; meanwhile, persuade the healthy to avoid risky
behaviour; discourage sero-positives from transmissive behaviour; educate the
public at large about the benefits of latex; provide what treatment and care
are available and financially acceptable; but do not impose, even less enforce,
sanctions.After all, individuals are responsible for their own behaviour; and sexual
governmentality, or the ‘self-imposed quarantine of the condomed’, was to take
over from state regulation and repression (Baldwin, 2005: 261, 263, 266-7).
Although confronted with the same biological problem, developed Western
states adopted different strategies. Only the Netherlands, Britain and non-Bavarian
Germany consistently adopted and implemented the ‘modern’, individualist
strategy. Most other states, among them countries with venerable civil liberty
traditions such as Sweden (Baldwin, 2005: 153-4, 227-8, 279-80) and the US
(Baldwin, 2005: 230-40), adopted the restrictive, traditional collectivist approach:
The unprecedentedly rapid growth of medical knowledge naturally
affected the measures implemented to counteract the spread of AIDS.At
the onset, with the disease believed to afflict especially the outcast and
marginal, the precautions broached included traditional sanctions….
When the disease was later thought to threaten the population at large,
… tactics changed to a more voluntary and consensual approach …
(originally) developed for chronic diseases. Still later, the wheel came
full circle as a new approach, taken because of the growing promise
of treatment, partly rehabilitated traditional precautions.… Coupled
to epidemiological reasons for a revised approach came a sociological
and political one: the wider spread of the disease among powerless
minorities.… Resistance to measures that subordinated individuals to
the group weakened accordingly. (Baldwin, 2005: 31-2)
In the gut response of states on how to deal with AIDS, adopting the traditional
or modernist strategy, the hand of history or path dependence made itself felt
through the sequencing of constraints on problem definitions. Path dependence
theory holds that only bounded innovation is possible.What happened at critical
junctures in the past affects possible outcomes of processes occurring later,
sometimes much later, in time. They set in motion mechanisms of continuity or
reproduction that keep channelling outcomes in a particular way; but without
completely precluding change in other directions (Thelen, 2003: 217-22). In
politics and administration, the slow wheels of legislation and bureaucracy generate
policies that have a high legacy or inheritance (Rose, 1990) or off-the-shelf or
incremental character. With the legal provisions and organisational repertoires
of fighting epidemics like cholera still available, the choice for politics and the
health profession presented itself as: follow the tried-and-tested old ways, or
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The governance of problems
relinquish them as outmoded and try a new approach. How this framing choice
was made partly depended on what Baldwin calls a historical deep-structure of
stable geographic, topographic and demographic factors, or ‘geo-epidemiology’.
For example, because of their geographical position as an outlier in Northern
Europe, beleaguered from all sides, and with a lack of economic necessity for an
open borders strategy, the Swedes stuck to a contain-and-control strategy. The
English, to the contrary, were ‘innovating’ the voluntaristic-consensual approach
for the same, but different-focused, historical causes:
Into the AIDS era, Sweden remained among the harshest interveners….
Its state elites were firmly convinced that, though Sweden’s approach
might be drastic, it was also effective and equitable in treating all
citizens as equally dangerous and culpable.… Swedish officials
congratulated themselves on already having their procedures in place.
With a venerable system for venereal diseases ready to go, it would
have been ridiculous not to apply it to HIV. The British … had their
system of venereal disease education and treatment in place by the
First World War.Their sanitationist and voluntarist bent continued into
the AIDS epidemic.… Lessons were consciously drawn from the past
to cement support for a liberal, consensual strategy. (Baldwin, 2005:
4, 227ff, 280-6)
Thus, historical deep structures and change mechanisms like institutional inertia
and lock-ins, hidden in the long-term memories of public health institutions
and professional communities, tilted the original structuring of the AIDS public
policy problem in two alternative directions.
In the problem typology, both AIDS policy problem frames fall in the moderately
structured (ends) quadrant.There was substantial agreement between relevant sets
of policy actors on the policy’s goals; but considerable dissent on appropriate,
effective and efficient means and risks of failure. Later policy adaptations appear to
be a matter of modulations on these originally selected major themes, depending on
additional constraints on the problem space. Such constraints originated from the
interaction between puzzling and powering: new scientific insights (puzzling), and
the political constellation of forces driving policy-making dynamics (powering).
Next to long-term structural causes effective through institutional memories of
the health profession, agencies’ short-term strategic political behaviour in historical
and local contingencies enters the explanatory scene.
Medical researchers quickly found out that AIDS was not (only) a sexually
transmissible disease. Other transmission routes through blood contacts (needle
exchange, blood transfusion, pregnancy of infected mothers) existed and were
equally important.The resulting idea that AIDS represented the return of classic,
acute epidemic transmissible disease, ‘the plague’, was short-lived. Laboratory
research resulted, not in fully effective cures, but in hybrid partial-cure-and-care
technologies that turned AIDS into a chronic disease like some forms of cancer.
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Analysing policy problems: a problem-structuring approach
Although these scientific developments certainly affected the problem’s tractability,
and made elements of a control-and-contain strategy more plausible again, it left
intact AIDS’s framing as a moderately structured (ends) problem.
The same goes for changes in the social incidence and political dynamics of
AIDS.The political-administrative elites took various policy initiatives depending
on their perception of the deserving or undeserving character of threatened or
afflicted groups. ‘Good’ citizens in general, haemophiliacs and white gay people
were deserving; others like drug addicts, prostitutes, the homeless and black
immigrants from former colonies in European countries were considered less or
undeserving. For the deserving groups, policy initiatives followed the individualistvoluntaristic approach; the undeserving groups were frequently confronted with
efforts to introduce or tighten more elements of the control-and-containment
strategy. Policy success depended partly on the political influence and pressure
these undeserving groups were nevertheless able to mobilise. In a delightful
analytic twist, Baldwin demonstrates the moral ambiguity hidden in the political
strategy of distinguishing between deserving and undeserving target populations
in anti-AIDS policy:
Holding individuals accountable for their actions and thus their health
had two sides: the individual responsibility of democratic citizenship
but also the blaming of victims for their own misfortunes … when
precautions were individualized, making all responsible for themselves,
the implication was that, if infection nonetheless ensued, no one was
to blame but oneself. Having apparently been thrown out the front
door, fault and blame were escorted in again through the back one.
(Baldwin, 2005: 263-4, emphasis added)
Next, Baldwin quotes a Swedish liberal politician arguing that legal restrictions are
only compulsory for the small minority of recalcitrants and criminals who resist
normal procedures – not for the bulk of honest, law-abiding, average citizens.The
logically ensuing re-moralisation of individualised public health policies against
AIDS is finally illustrated by a German politician, also a liberal one, who expresses
his conviction that condoms are good, but fidelity is better (Baldwin, 2005: 268).
Wrong-problem problems
There is one final analytical point to be made.The social and political distribution
of political and policy actors’ problem frames normally results in the political
selection of a temporarily stable, dominant problem frame for governmental
policy through a combination of path-dependent institutionalisation processes and
political strategising in various stages of policy making.This opens the possibility
of serious mismatches between the effectively dominant governmental problem
definition, and alternative problem framings alive among other groups in society.
Using a mathematical and statistical metaphor, some authors call this a Type III error:
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The governance of problems
One of the most popular paradigms in mathematics describes the case
in which a researcher has either to accept or reject a null hypothesis.
In a first course in statistics the student learns that he must constantly
balance between making an error of the first kind (that is, rejecting the
null hypothesis when it is true) and an error of the second kind (that is,
accepting the null hypothesis when it is false) … practitioners all too
often make errors of a third kind: solving the wrong problem. (Raiffa,
1968: 264; compare Mason and Mitroff, 1981; and Dunn, 2004: 85-6)
This idea is important. After all, distinguishing between types of policy problems
by the way they are cognitively framed is meant to improve our political
understanding of structural mechanisms and agential strategies that either
contribute to or hamper the solution, resolution or control of particular societal
problems through collective action. In the case of AIDS, such a structural
mismatch might have emerged, had voluminous and politically strong parts of
the population insisted on defining AIDS, not as a moderately structured (ends),
but as a moderately structured (means) problem. On an international scale, the
outrage among Western politicians, health professionals and medical researchers
triggered by ‘denialist’ South-African anti-AIDS policies, is a good indicator of
the potentially disastrous political controversy that such a mismatch might cause in
national political systems.Yet, ‘dissenting’ groups may have good reasons for their
deviating but preferred problem framing.With no cheap medical treatment against
AIDS available due to R&D and marketing strategies of Western multinational
pharmaceutical corporations, nor any serious financial aid from rich donor
countries to buy their expensive medicines, defining North–South political and
economic discrepancies in the remit of AIDS policy makes political sense from a
South-African point of view. The political function and potential value of such
symbolic politics is to keep issues on the public and political agenda (Hoppe, 1989).
Here it suffices to acknowledge that due to strongly divergent problem
decompositions among groups of policy actors and hard to redirect path
dependencies and institutionally entrenched beliefs, attitudes and routine practices,
Type III errors or wrong-problem problems do occur in politics and public policy.
When they are present, they trigger or fuel controversy and deadlocks.The concept
of the wrong-problem problem will be used as a heuristically sensitising concept
for cases where political or administrative institutions with the authority and power
to define and delineate a problem space either (a) consider a problem structured
where it should instead have more plausibly been defined as moderately structured,
or (b) where it is defined as moderately structured when it actually is completely
unstructured, or should be more plausibly defined as a moderately structured
problem of a different kind. Policy designers and those who politically adopt such
designs as official policy erroneously assume sufficient agreement on the values
at stake, or sufficient amounts of certainty on relevant knowledge claims. This
definition is consistent with the criteria used to define the four problem types.
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Analysing policy problems: a problem-structuring approach
In politics, however, wrong-problem problems are frequently not ‘mistakes’ in
the intellectual sense of the word. They occur due to what has been called the
‘rationality of power’ (Flyvbjerg, 1998: 225-36). More precisely, those in possession
of control over the means of rationality – scientists, policy advisers, policy analysts,
risk analysts and so on – may be able to describe, interpret and analyse the multiple
ways in which other politically and policy relevant parties frame a problem.
However, those who actually control the means of power, may unilaterally define
‘reality’, that is, they have the power to decide that a particular problem will be
treated as if it were of a certain problem type; thereby ignoring alternative problem
framings. In doing so, they also decide on the types of cognitive instruments or
methods and the types of political and administrative interactions to be used in
‘solving’ the problem. In other words still, those in power, deliberately or in their
own blindness, define what counts as ‘rationality’ and knowledge.The relationship
between power and rationality in problem framing is asymmetrical: ‘power has
a rationality that rationality does not know. Rationality, on the other hand, does
not have a power that that power does not know’ (Flyvbjerg, 1998: 234).11
Notes
In terms of Lowi (1997: 196, 198) himself:‘It is quite conceivable that political scientists
can develop criteria for policy choice in terms of predicted and desired impacts on the
political system, just as economists, biologists, and the like attempt to predict and guide
policies according to their societal impacts.… [I]f two policies have about an equal chance
of failure or success in the achievement of some social purpose the legislature has agreed
upon, then the one should be preferred that has the most desirable impact on the political
system’. Here I will not elaborate on this normative use of issue typologies. I will return
to it in Chapter Eight.
1
As far as hypothesised impacts of policies as statutes on the working of the political
power arena are concerned, Lowi (1972, in McCool, 1995: 184) clearly states that it is the
perception of top-most officials, for example presidents, that count. However, it remains
true that he does not say how to deal with divergent views of different types of policy actors.
2
In that sense, policy instrument typologies in the policy and administrative sciences,
whether of the first substantive, or second procedural variety (Howlett, 2004), are the
successors of the first Lowian typologies developed in the 1960s and 1970s.
3
More recent theories like the advocacy coalition framework (Sabatier and Jenkins-Smith,
1993), punctuated equilibrium dynamics (Baumgartner and Jones, 1993) or evolutionary
models of policy dynamics (John, 1998) perhaps do a better job in specifying the many
independent and intermediary variables; but as far as integration effects are concerned,
they hardly fare better.
4
Safranski (2005 [1999]: 214-215 writes, ‘Behind every value attribution hides the will
to power’.This is equally true for the ‘highest values’:‘God, the ideas, the metaphysical.…
5
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The governance of problems
However, even the will to power has misunderstood itself for a long time. People believed
to discover independent essences, while, in fact, they invented them out of the force of
the will to power…. They have denied their own value-creating energy…. Obviously,
they would rather be victim and receiver than author and giver, perhaps out of fear for
their own freedom’ [translation RH].
I do not claim any originality here.To my knowledge, the typology was first constructed
and used by Thompson and Tuden (1959) in order to link decision styles to organisational
structures. It has been used later by numerous authors in many different fields: business
management (Nutt, 1989), policy studies (Douglas and Wildavsky, 1983; Dryzek and
Ripley, 1988), science, technology and society studies (Ezrahi, 1980), organisation studies
and organisational learning (Crossan et al, 1993; Stacey, 1996; Choo, 1998), and this list
is far from exhaustive. Of course, the multiple uses by numerous authors strengthen my
judgement that the typology is valid across many fields of application (see Chapter Five).
6
Consult Callahan (2003) and Hoppe (2008a) for the presence of not-so-structured
problems in medicine and healthcare.
7
The ‘wickedness’ of unstructured problems, of course, is the opposite of ‘domestication’
in structured problems. Note how the use of the concept of ‘wicked problems’ in the
governmental reform literature completely misses the political and cognitive aspects of
unstructured problems by defining them as problems ‘that cross departmental boundaries
and resist the solutions that are readily available through the action of one agency’
(representative example in 6 et al, 2002: 34). Focusing on the technical, administrative
and organisational aspects of service delivery for particular problems turns almost any
problem into a ‘wicked’ one. Putting a man on the moon, for instance, would be an
extremely ‘wicked’ problem; so would offshore oil drilling for energy safety.Yet, we know
that these are structured, quite ‘doable’ problems, albeit managerially and technically very
complex ones. In the original meaning of the word, it is the inextricable mix of (cognitive)
puzzlement and political conflict that makes tackling certain problems unstructured or
‘wicked’.
8
Following Hisschemöller (1993: 26-7), I reject the terminology of ‘well-structuredness’
and ‘ill-structuredness’ of problems. They are value-laden concepts, apparently accepting
the desirability of moving away from unstructured problems as soon as possible towards
technically controllable structured problems. As will become clearer in what follows, I
prefer to speak of unstructured problems when authoritative decision makers and their
policy designers acknowledge the unstructured nature of a public policy problem. Problems
are ill-structured when they deny or only partially acknowledge this.
9
This is not to say that science cannot contribute to the control of moderately structured
(means) problems. I will return to this theme in Chapter Five.
10
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Analysing policy problems: a problem-structuring approach
A vivid example of how this works in practice is given by an American journalist
reporting on a meeting with a Bush government aide (Ron Suskind, ‘Without a doubt’,
The NewYork Times Magazine, 17 October 2004):‘In the summer of 2002, after I had written
an article … that the White House didn’t like … I had a meeting with a senior adviser to
Bush. He expressed the White House’s displeasure, and then he told me something that
at the time I didn’t fully comprehend – but which I now believe gets to the very heart
of the Bush presidency.The aide said that guys like me were “in what we call the realitybased community,” which he defined as people who “believe that solutions emerge from
your judicious study of discernible reality.” I nodded and murmured something about
enlightenment principles and empiricism. He cut me off. “That’s not the way the world
really works anymore,” he continued. “We’re an empire now, and when we act, we create
our own reality. And while you’re studying that reality – judiciously, as you will – we’ll
act again, creating other new realities, which you can study too, and that’s how things will
sort out.We’re history’s actors ... and you, all of you, will be left to just study what we do.”
11
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FOUR
Cultures of public policy problems
‘[R]eceived culture’ seems to have had a greater role in defining the
range of legitimate alternatives than any policy elite or interest group.
(Bosso, 1994: 199)
Introduction
Why do some proximate policy makers prefer to frame and define problems
as (over)structured and not un(der)structured? May one predict that policy
makers who adhere to different cultures or ways of life will be more inclined to
construct and process some problem types rather than other types? How about
the congruence between policy makers’ preferred ways of problem framing and
structuring, and the cultural inclinations of people in civil society?
This chapter constructs a culturalist theory of the socio-political contexts
of problem framing and structuring in the public domain in Western welfare
states. Proximate and authoritative policy makers mobilise cultural bias in their
authoritative selection of problem definitions, expressed in official policy designs.
This triggers and fuels processes of translation and framing dynamics; processes
that, through political communications in the media and the practices of policy
implementation, impinge on the debates over problem frames among citizens in
civil society. In this way, ordinary people interpret official policy intentions and
practices; and come to attribute positive or negative meanings to governmental
policy performances (Schneider and Ingram, 1997).
Using grid-group cultural theory and the typology of policy problems, it is
shown how, in such translation and framing dynamics, each culture or way of
life corresponds to a particular problem-framing and problem-definition strategy.
Hierarchists will impose a clear structure on any problem, no matter what. Isolates
will see social reality as an unstable casino in which any privileged problem
structure jeopardises chances for survival. Enclavists (or egalitarians) will frame
any policy problem as an issue of fairness and distributive justice. Individualists
will exploit any bit of usable knowledge to improve a problematic situation.
These four focal or default strategies are part of larger repertories of problemframing and problem-definition strategies; each cultural solidarity type disposes
of a differentially composed set of secondary, fall-back strategies. Finally, it is
suggested that the links between grid-group cultural theory and policy problem
types may serve the policy worker or practitioner as analytic tool for active and
(self-)critical problem structuring and (re)framing.
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The governance of problems
Cultural roots of policy problem structuring
Framing civil aviation expansion
In the mid-1990s, the Dutch government was seriously pondering the future of
civil aviation in its national economy. The focal point was what should happen
to Schiphol Airport Amsterdam, at the time Europe’s fourth largest airport in
passengers and freight, and fiercely expanding at a projected 9% growth rate
per year. To support Cabinet decision making, the government organised a
public inquiry. It was designed as a ‘societal dialogue’ with some 80 participants,
ranging from government departments, local governments in the area, the airport
authorities, related industries and other business interests, vested interests like
employers’, trade unions’ and environmental movements’ representatives, and
inhabitants of residential areas in Schiphol Airport’s vicinity. From the end of
1996 until July 1997, this heterogeneous stakeholder forum was to discuss the
policy problem, phrased by the Cabinet as ‘should the government accommodate
further growth of civil aviation; and if so, how?’ (TNLI, 1997: 8)
During the dialogue, five problem frames emerged. Some framed the problem
as one of international economic competition on a globalising market, and
argued that expansion of civil aviation infrastructure was a sheer necessity. Others
framed it as a public budget problem, and argued the opposite by claiming that
expansion would be a squandering of public funds. Yet others viewed the problem
as one of essentially regional accommodation of expanding airport facilities, or
as ecological modernisation of the civil aviation sector, or as finding sustainable
solutions to growing demands for mobility. From these perspectives, the ‘yeah/nay’
dilemma of the former two problem frames, logically implied in the government’s
phrasing of its policy problem, was superseded by more complex, qualified and
innovative answers. When the chips came down, however, the Cabinet chose to
continue policies of the previous 30 years to conditionally tolerate the airport’s
(infrastructure) expansion. It obviously ignored the richer problem definitions
(Van Eeten, 2001) and failed to arrange a subsequent governance space for a
creative confrontation of different levels and problematic aspects of the overall
problem (RMNO, 2009).
Received culture
Like in this example, policy scholars frequently observe that ‘at the regime or
macro-level of discussion and analysis there are remarkably few alternatives
actually under debate’ (Bosso, 1994: 184). The explanation is hardly deliberate
elite influence or interest group pressure, but ‘received culture’ (Bosso, 1994:
199). Sometimes a cultural regime implicitly suppresses many alternative problem
definitions. At other times, when core values are no longer stable or self-evident,
they trigger heated and protracted controversies and even outright political conflict
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Cultures of public policy problems
and stalemate. This is perhaps most clearly shown in the anti- versus pro-gun
control debate in the US. Guns are historically saturated with conflicting meanings:
Used to wrest national independence and to tame the western frontier,
guns are thought to resonate as symbols of ‘honor’,‘courage’,‘chivalry’,
and ‘individual self-sufficiency’.… As tools of the trade of both the
military and the police, guns are also emblems of state authority …
others see it as expressing distrust of and indifference toward others….
For those who fear guns, the historical reference points are not the
American Revolution or the settling of the frontier, but the postbellum period, in which the privilege of owning guns in the South
was reserved to whites, and the 1960s, when gun-wielding assassins
killed … John and Robert Kennedy, and Martin Luther King jr. To
these citizens, guns are emblems not of state authority, but of racism
and reaction. (Braman and Kahan 2003a: 10-11; also Vizzard, 1995)
In both cases, policy problems are seen as cultural and political constructions.
Harry Eckstein (1997: 26) defines culture as ‘the variable and cumulatively
learned patterns of orientations to action in societies’. In line with the assumption
of human beings as cognitive misers, such patterns of orientations economise
action by relieving people of the impossible task of interpreting afresh every
situation before acting. They also render interactions between people, who may
be complete strangers, predictable through conventions, habits, rules, routines and
institutions. Thus, a culturalist approach to problem definition claims that limits
to rationality are primarily cultural; and so are the rules for imposing closure on
problem framing and definition, the invention of alternatives, and the scope of
costs and benefits considered.
Yet, policy scientists have hardly begun taking the next logical step: if a policy
problem is a politico-cultural phenomenon, one should self-consciously construct
a theory of problem framing and problem structuring in public policy making
on a systematic culturalist approach to a politics of meaning. Granted, we have
Joseph Gusfield’s (1981) brilliant research essay The culture of public problems:
Drinking-driving and the symbolic order. In this book, Gusfield uses anthropological
and literary concepts like dramaturgy, ritual and rhetoric to interpret how the
history of social and collective problematic situations gives rise to political
definitions of problems of public policy.We owe to Gusfield the important insight
that the structure of public problems is always made up of the interrelationships
between three symbolic elements: problem ownership (or who claims a say in
defining a problem?); causality (or which theory of causes and consequences of
the problematic situation is publicly espoused?); and accountability (or who is
praised or blamed for [failing to] solve the problem?) (Gusfield, 1981: 6ff).
However, even after almost 30 years since Gusfield’s important publication,
later developments remain disappointing. Rochefort and Cobb’s (1994) and
Cobb and Ross’ (1997a) books offer good examples of this trend, in spite of
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The governance of problems
their rich empirical illustrations. In addition, Gusfield’s study is based on just
one single case, in one part of the US, in the 1970s.Yet, the book’s title speaks of
‘the’ culture of public problems, and about ‘the’ symbolic order. Such premature
generalisation deserves challenging. Gusfield’s merit is in his way of conceptualising
the theoretical problem. Leaning on his work, this chapter will attempt to
complement it by using empirical and theoretical work from the policy sciences
on the typology of policy problems. It will demonstrate that not singularity, but
plurality rules; that it is more useful to speak of several cultural styles in policy
problem framing, with each style featuring its own typical problem structure in
Gusfield’s sense of the term.
What is grid-group cultural theory?
Types of cultural theory
In a culturalist approach, one may distinguish between the attitudinal and the
inclusive approaches. The attitudinal approaches, like the civic culture (for
example, in Almond and Verba, 1963) and the (post-)materialist culture studies
in political science (Inglehart, 1990), use a restrictive definition of culture as
a mental product of individuals, that is, meanings, values, norms and symbols.
Culture is operationalised as the aggregate of individual attitudes, and individuals
are seen as single units of analysis, free from social contexts. In policy analysis, this
social-psychological approach leads to the assumption of possible congruence or
harmony between policy and political culture, where differences in culture have
to be bridged by an ‘imposed’, unifying governance culture (Van Gunsteren, nd).
The inclusive approach defines culture more comprehensively. First, in a socialconstructivist fashion, culture is seen as a way of world making, or as a way of
creating conceptual order and intelligibility through labels, categories and other
principles of vision and division. Second, culture is studied as part and parcel of
a way of life; individuals are seen in the context of prior social solidarities and
institutions. In research and policy analysis, the inclusive approach leads to ‘an
institutional theory of multiple equilibriums, in which different cultural contexts
have opposing effects upon the thought and action of the individual’ (Grendstad
and Selle, 1999: 46).
Within the inclusive approach, there is a further split between the romantic
and modernist vision of culture (Van Gunsteren, nd). In the romantic version, the
study of culture is a lifelong undertaking; only ‘going native’ provides the feel for
detail and the finegrained distinction necessary fur truly grasping the essence of
another (sub)culture; and the set of cultures is infinite in complexity and variety. In
policy studies and analysis, this leads to advocacy for one particular culture, or to
becoming a specialist, like the area specialists in the analysis of international politics
and foreign policy. In modernist, Marxist and technological visions, culture is a
dependent variable of underlying economic and technological realities. For policy
studies and analysis, quick analysis and practical understanding of culture is possible,
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Cultures of public policy problems
but at the cost of seeing it as false consciousness in need of a reality correction.
Grid-group cultural theory avoids both extremes. Being familiar with its four
ideal-typical cultures – hierarchy, enclavism/egalitarianism, isolationism/fatalism
and individualism – speeds up analysis and orientation because it is a continuous
warning sign against assuming one homogeneous culture, or applying just one
particular cultural lens to analyse a policy problem. The social-constructivism
underlying cultural theory will prevent one from falling into the trap of reducing
culture to false consciousness.
Cultural theory was first developed by Mary Douglas. She tried to remedy
the failure of anthropologists to systematically compare cultures (Douglas,
1978). Consequently, Douglas herself elaborated the theory (especially, Douglas,
1986), but it was also quickly put to use in understanding policy debates on
environmental problems and risks (Douglas and Wildavsky, 1983). In the 1980s
and 1990s, the cultural theory bandwagon was joined by authors from many
different social science disciplines, like Michael Thompson, Steve Rayner, Chris
Lockhart, Richard Ellis and Christopher Hood. In 1990, Thompson, Ellis and
Wildavsky produced what still stands as the most comprehensive statement and
justification of cultural theory between the covers of one book (Thompson et
al, 1990). In this way, cultural theory came to political science (Thompson et al,
1999) and policy studies and analysis (Hoppe, 2002, 2007).
Grid and group
Cultural theorists claim that the social world ticks the way it does due to selective
affinity and mutual dependency between social relations, cultural biases and
behavioural strategies.Therefore, adherents of grid-group cultural theory belong
in the inclusive camp.The theory distinguishes between internal structures called
‘grid’ and external structures called ‘group’. Grid refers to the types of rules that
relate people to one another on an ego-centred basis. Grid is low when there
are few binding rules, and when people negotiate rules among themselves.
Therefore, if grid is low, you get symmetrical transactions. Grid is high when
rules are numerous and complex, and when they are imposed without people
having much of a say in accepting or rejecting them. Therefore, if grid is high,
you get asymmetrical transactions. Group refers to the experience of belonging
to a bounded social unit. High group means that people identify strongly with
those they see as members. Thus, if group is high, you get restricted transactions.
Low group means that people don’t care for membership but for people who
are intrinsically interesting for some reason or other. If group is low, you get less
exclusive, unrestricted transactions.
The group and grid dimensions of human transactions are constructed as the
ultimate causal drivers in ordering social relations. These give rise to cultural
biases as justifications for particular social orders. As justifications and sets of
available orientations to action, the cultural biases influence behaviour by making
it patterned and coherent.The properties of social relations in grid-group cultural
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The governance of problems
theory are about relational patterns, or stable types of transactions between
people. Combining the group and grid dimensions gives you a social map with
four types of relationships. Two of them – markets and hierarchy – are well known
and thoroughly analysed in the social science literature (e.g. Lindblom, 1977,
2001). However, if the known types of social relationships are classified by two
discriminators, a full typology should, in addition, pay attention to the other two
possibilities: clans or enclaves, and systems of isolation or zero-networks (see
Figure 4.1.)
Figure 4.1: Cultural theory’s grid/group typology
Asymmetrical
transactions
+ GRID
GROUP + Restricted
transactions
Unrestricted
transactions
Symmetrical
transactions
Sources: Thompson (1996); symbols taken from front page of Schmutzer (1994)
Grid-group cultural theory’s fundamental claim is that corresponding to these four
types of social relationships are cultural biases. These refer to sets of shared values
and beliefs (Thompson et al, 1990: 1) or stable orientations to action (Eckstein:
1988: 790) or dispositions/habitus (Bourdieu, 1998: 6). They are thought of as
judgements of value, which function as justifications of specific organisational
structures. It is supposed that each develops its own typical set of beliefs, a cognitive
and moral bias that contributes to reflexivity in the social organisation (Douglas,
1998). In the language of complexity theory, the cultural biases function as stable
attractors in socio-cultural landscapes. Grid-group cultural theory posits four
viable or long-term sustainable cultural biases. These are:
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Cultures of public policy problems
• active or competitive individualism (Thompson et al, 1990: 34-5);
• pattern-maintaining or conservative hierarchy (Douglas and Wildavsky, 1983:
90-2);
• egalitarian sects or dissident enclaves (Douglas, 1986: 38-40; Sivan, 1995: 1618); and
• backwater isolates or fatalists (Schmutzer, 1994; Douglas, 1996b: 183-7).
Michael Thompson claims the existence of a fifth cultural bias: indifference to
and active avoidance of the group and grid dimensions of life result in hermitlike autonomy.
The orientations or dispositions underlying cultural biases guide judgement and
action in many ways. Cultural theorists have inquired into the interpretive and
more practical correspondences between the cultural biases and action strategies in
many social fields (for an overview, see Mamadouh, 1999). Perhaps the theory’s
most important claim here is its rigorous demonstration of the poverty of
(individualist) ‘homo economicus’ as the model for all individual behaviour, and
thus the existence of ‘missing persons’ in much of contemporary social science
(Thompson et al, 1990: 40-7; Douglas and Ney, 1998). Complementary models
like, for example, Simon’s (1947) ‘homo administrator’ (for hierarchy), sectarian
man and fatalist man would be necessary to fill in the gaps.
Cultural dynamics
To some, the group/grid scheme is basically a typology. If looked at as a
construction of ideal types to which reality does not correspond in a one-toone way, cultural theory as grid-group analysis offers considerable conceptual
resources for comparative research and theory development. Real-life phenomena
can be analysed as dyadic or triadic hybrids (Hood, 1998); the process of hybrid
formation can take different time paths and have different critical junctures; and,
therefore, some such hybrids may show more stability through time than others.
Other theories conceptualise social change as faster or slower movement from
one to another pole on a one-dimensional scale (modernism – postmodernism,
materialism – postmaterialism). Grid-group analysis obliges one to perform the
more demanding task to trace (simultaneous) changes between the four quadrants
of its two-dimensional socio-cultural space (Thompson et al, 1990: 75ff).
One more element deserves elucidation, that is, grid-group cultural theory’s
account of social and political change. Culturalist approaches generally have
often been rejected as too static, better geared to explaining social stability than
transformation. Social stability is unlikely as grid-group cultural theory views
the mutual engagement of the four cultures/solidarities as continuous social and
political struggle. The gist of grid-group cultural theory has been captured by
pointing out that:
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The governance of problems
[M]odes of social control are the focal point…. Individual choice …
may be constricted either through requiring that a person be bound
by group decisions or by demanding that individuals follow the rules
accompanying their station in life. Social control is a form of power.…
It is the form of power – who is or is not entitled to exercise power
over others – that differs [between the ways of life]. (Thompson et
al, 1990: 6)
Moreover, Douglas stresses the institution-based and constitution-making nature
of human choice:
In the social sciences, a choice is treated as … arising out of the needs
inside the individual psyche.... [In t]he theory of culture … a choice
is an act of allegiance and a protest against the undesired model of
society.… [E]ach type of culture is by its nature hostile to the other
three cultures.… [A]ll four coexist in a state of mutual antagonism in
any society at all times. (Douglas, 1986; 1996a: 43)
The continuous struggles for cultural hegemony in different social fields imply
agonistic interactions between people. Therefore, the theory hardly predicts the
social harmony characteristic of theories of social stability. Grid-group cultural
theory’s model of social change as political and social struggle for cultural
hegemony and learning makes the theory eminently suitable as the core of the
translation and framing dynamics in the study of the politics of problem framing.
Cultural theory and spaces for public discourse
One way of thinking of a political culture is as a discursive space within which a
polity’s public discourse may legitimately move. The legitimate discursive space
is ‘inhabited’ by a number of belief systems. Political scientists habitually narrow
the discursive space for Western democratic political discourse by modelling it as
a one-dimensional left – right or materialist – postmaterialist continuum. Cultural
theory breaks a social and political system down into at least four constituent
elements, and some more hybrid forms if necessary for adequate analysis.
In late-modern, capitalist and democratic welfare states one would expect to
find a preponderance of an individualist way of life, with all kinds of politically
active shades of the other solidarities. First, welfare states are based on a capitalist
order of production and consumption. An entrepreneurial class with relatively
easy access to public policy making dominates the organisation of economic life
(Lindblom, 1977, 2001).The culture of competitive individualism characterises this
entrepreneurial class. In a country like the Netherlands, an individualist cultural
bias and its concomitant governance style is estimated to resonate well with
almost one quarter (23%) of the electorate (Motivaction, 2001). Second, welfare
states depend on a strong state, which intervenes in capitalism in order to secure
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Cultures of public policy problems
stable economic, social and, if possible, ecologically sustainable development.
State agencies and adjacent public sector organisations depend on professional
and scientific expertise. People inhabiting such organisations, while constrained
by the function of their institutions in a capitalist economic order, will also display
a cultural blend of hierarchic collectivism and egalitarian distributive justice.
There are claims by political scientists that the electorate has steadily increased
in knowledgeability and critical, monitoring skills.Yet, almost one fifth (18%) of
the Dutch electorate may be said to belong to the type of ‘deferential citizens’
(Almond and Verba, 1963), which feels strongly attracted to a hierarchical cultural
bias in politics and public policy (Motivaction, 2001).Third, both capitalism and
bureaucracy give rise to movements and trends that reflect, in their strongest
manifestation, anti-statist and anti-bureaucratic idealism. A common feature is a
call for more public and political participation in the name of ‘small is beautiful’
communitarian ideals. In a milder variation, people believe in a government and
a bureaucracy that is more flexible, coordinating, joined-up or even ‘holistic’, in
the sense of uniting public and private organisations in collaborative governance
networks. Here, a mix of egalitarian and individualistic cultures is at work.
Although no more than one tenth of the Dutch electorate can be labelled as
strong egalitarians, the hybrid egalitarian-individualist bias is popular among
approximately one third (30%) (Motivaction, 2001).
Finally, all three types of elites struggle for power over public policy making,
as each desires its ideas to control the content, implementation and outcomes of
public policies.This is where the ‘grip’ phenomenon comes in. Each of the different
ways of life both organises its own adherents and simultaneously attempts to
disorganise the others. Individualist entrepreneurs try to both organise bureaucracy
in one-stop shops for their own convenience, but simultaneously disorganise it
by minimising state rules that interfere with their preferred ideas of competition
and ‘a level playing field’. Counter-elites with an egalitarian bent will attempt
to replace individualist interpretations of equality as equal starting conditions by
their equality of results. And so on, and so forth. All three politically active, but
more or less hybrid, ways of life – individualism, hierarchy and egalitarianism –
attempt to mobilise the explicit or implicit support of an apparently apathetic or
fatalistic mass of isolated spectators. Research by Motivaction (2001) shows that
a surprising 30% of the Dutch electorate belongs to this category of ‘outsiders’.
They are:
the cultural equivalent of compost: a rich, generalised and unstructured
resource, formed from the detritus of the active biases, and upon which
these active biases, each in its distinctive way, can then draw for its
own sustenance.… Fatalists, therefore, are an essential component of
the total system, even though (indeed, precisely because) they do not
feature in the policy debates that so exercise the three active ways of
life. (Thompson et al, 1990: 93-4)
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In other words, and following Schattschneider (1960) who defined politics as
the organisation of bias, the translation and framing dynamics around possibly
authoritative problem definitions may be conceptualised as mobilisation strategies
of the three active solidarities in capitalist welfare states to achieve cultural and
political hegemony for their bias in political definitions of public problems and
solutions. Such strategies may involve all sorts of advocacy (Sabatier and JenkinsSmith, 1993) and discourse coalitions (Hajer, 1995) between management,
expertise, bureaucracy and counter-elites, all trying to interpret, but also to
influence and win over, public opinion to its side.
Towards a systematic culturalist theory of problem
structuring
Do some proximate policy makers with voice in the political framing of policy
issues prefer to structure a problem as Type A rather than Type B, and why? Can
policy actors adhering to different ways of life or solidarities,1 that is, hierarchy,
enclavism, individualism and isolationism,2 be predicted to have differential skills
in dealing with different problem types? Can we predict different problem-framing
and problem-structuring strategies from policy makers or analysts belonging to
different cultural solidarities when confronted with problematic situations?
These larger questions will be ordered in sub-questions, which follow the logic
of the problem typology presented in Chapter Three. First, can one predict the
primary orientation of an adherent of a particular solidarity to frame a problematic
situation as a particular type of problem? Second, what can we say about
dispositions and skills in coping with the remaining other types? In answering
these questions, the starkest contrasts will be treated first. The best-studied type
is the hierarchist policy maker or analyst, who is an expert in framing and then
solving structured problems.Then the least-studied and frequently overlooked one
is presented: the isolate policy maker or analyst, who sees unstructured problems
everywhere and identifies solving them with personal and organisational survival.
Next comes the individualist type, who wants to move away from problems, if
only a few inches. Finally, one arrives at the enclavist policy maker, who sees
value conflicts as the root cause of every problem and their overcoming as a
precondition to any solution.
Hierarchists: ‘structure it!’
Policy makers and analysts working in large, complex bureaucracies of the public
and corporate sectors are clearly exposed to strong hierarchical social relationships
and interaction patterns.3 These organisational structures themselves express a
cultural bias or general disposition to world making characterised as paradigm
protection (Thompson and Wildavsky, 1986: 280-1) or belief in ‘strong’ theories or
methods – if possible, certified by science, or more traditionally, founded in religion.
Although these two are often believed to be mutually exclusive, in a hierarchist
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world they are in fact compatible.4 In a modern handbook on socio-cybernetic
policy analysis,‘a systematic methodology for understanding and solving complex
real world social problems’ (Rastogi, 1992: 12), we do indeed find them both,
side by side.5 In the beginning of his book, Rastogi professes that any effort at
problem solving begins with an ordered knowledge base, generated by a scientific
methodology and an interdisciplinary theoretical language fit for complexity:
‘The methodology is based on the cybernetic concepts of feedback cycles. The
conceptual base … is extremely parsimonious. It abjures ad hoc assumptions; it
is coherent and consistent in its approach, procedures and analytic capabilities; it
permits assessment of the validity of analysis; and, its inferences are empirically
testable’ (Rastogi, 1992: 12).
Turning to the topic of long-term, lasting solutions, Rastogi (1992: 16) opines
that the root causes of social problems are ‘the abnormal or disturbed emotions/
motives of the social actors participating or involved in the problem situations’.
To ‘nullify’ these, we need a belief system of ‘super-rational values’:
The only basis on which the intrinsic nature of moral values may be
posited and all human beings may naturally and harmoniously relate
themselves together is their common identification with the Divine.
(…) This framework of truth, love, inner serenity, and righteous action
… is rational in an absolute and universal sense. It provides the basis
for eliminating the polluting symptoms of horror in social problems. It
makes possible a lasting and steady state solution to the malfunctioning
of social systems. (Rastogi, 1992: 114, 117)
Given these world-making orientations, the hierarchist’s rationality is functional
and analytic. It is functional in the sense of starting from a supposedly agreed
objective, as a function of which the most effective and efficient means is worked
out. It is analytic in the sense that problem solving is considered an intellectual or
cognitive effort, best left to experts. A long time ago, Simon (1947) had already
shown how this type of instrumental, bounded rationality can be systematically
applied to create complex bureaucratic structures in which everyone expertly
solves their partial problem within the decision premises or constraints imposed
by the organisation’s leadership. This means two things. First, through clever
organisational design, humans can aspire to levels of rationality unachievable
for the individual mind. Rationality, although bounded, may keep aspiring
for comprehensiveness through social organisation. Second, the whole idea
presupposes that problems come in a neatly packaged form; and if they do not,
they can be made to come that way. ‘Structure it!’ is the hierarchist’s primary
orientation to the framing of problems.
How would a hierarchist policy maker or analyst deal with the manifold
dimensions or aspects of real-life problematic situations as experienced by people,
and turn these into a policy problem? Or, alternatively, what is a problem, so that
it may be properly structured or defined for a hierarchist policy maker? (see Dery,
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The governance of problems
1984: 21-7; Hoppe, 1989: 23-4.) Three such rules for problem shaping and bringing
closure on a problem definition appear to be typical. The first and foremost
condition to structure a problem is decomposability6 along lines pre-formatted by
a paradigm in science, discipline, profession, political ideology, religion, or simply
imposed by the organisational leadership and management. The problematic
situation must be considered decomposable into relatively independent problem
parts.This done, one may define the most important or salient variables or causes
of these problem parts. Rastogi (1992: 120) puts it like this:
Q.What are the most important elements of a phenomenon/problem?
How may they be identified? A. Salient variables in the multi-cycle
structure of a phenomenon/problem represent its most important
elements. They are identified as variables associated with the largest
number of input and output links.
The second condition is that the problem should be viewed from an interventionist
perspective; the government or some other institution and its leadership must
be presented as in control of the problematic situation, that is, in a position and
endowed with resources to remedy it. In its turn, this means two things. First, the
hierarchist policy maker/analyst should know precisely what the goal is, that is,
knows how to specify what the solution to the problem looks like.
Our exemplary hierarchist analyst, Rastogi (1992: 56) speaks of determining the
‘goal state’ of the system by observing the ‘viability’ or effectiveness of variables
in relation to ‘a system’s ‘health’:
The solution of a problem refers to achieving a potential state of the
problem situation wherein all the feedback cycles in the problem’s
multi-loop structure are operating in accordance with their intended
regulatory roles of stability and/or growth. In each cycle, there is little
or no discrepancy between the observed and desired values of the
criterion variables. (Rastogi, 1992: 59)
Second, it means the identification of manipulable variables and major constraints
from the regulator’s or governmental perspective:
Cybernetic methodology also provides additional insights toward
policy identification.They are based on the identification of the most
significant control, constraint, and change lever factors in a problem’s
multi-cycle structure. Control factors are those variables, which
exercise a major controlling influence on the internal interactions
within a problem’s dynamic structure. Constraint factors are those
variables, which constitute the major impediments in efforts to change
the problem’s behaviour. Change lever factors are those variables of
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fundamental importance, which determine the strategy for long-term
change in the problem’s state and course. (Rastogi, 1992: 64-5)
The third condition is the translation of insights into control, constraint and
leverage factors into detailed, custom-made action plans for a given organisation
or set of organisations faced with a particular problem. In addition to a distinction
between short- and long-term measures, this means developing an analytic capacity
to differentiate between the relative importance of policy alternatives in relation
to the relative urgency of problem dimensions:
Differential relative importance of policy measures, and differing
relative significance of problem dimensions, may be determined by
a binary matrix analytic procedure, based on the concept of plural
applicability of a solution/policy measure to more than one facet
of the problem. (…) (This) is vitally necessary in the context of the
optimal allocation of resources and efforts…. (Rastogi, 1992: 74-5)
The practical implication of this third rule is that, from the regulator’s cognitive
and evaluative perspective, some parts of the problem are not worth solving.
Regarding all the rules for creating a structured problem, hierarchic policy makers
effectively invert the common-sense logic of a one-to-one relation running from
a problem to a solution.What counts as a ‘problem’ in fact depends on the chosen,
elaborated ‘solution’ (Rittel and Webber, 1973: 161; Hoppe, 1989: 17).
An illustration is smoking regulation in the US (based on Nathanson, 1999).
Until the 1950s, most people saw smoking, the smoker and cigarette smoke
as emblems of power, autonomy, modernity and sexuality. Consequently, the
smoking problem as a public issue was non-existent. This started to change
slowly as a discourse coalition between the large health voluntaries, the federal
public health service and policy entrepreneurs representing a well-educated,
high middle-class non-smokers’ rights movement, succeeded in structuring the
problem. First, they successfully used a number of paradigmatic templates to
change the meaning of smoking. On the relevant knowledge side, there was the
paradigm of epidemiological research, enabling the American Cancer Association
to use its huge volunteer constituency to establish beyond dispute the causal
connection between smoking and lung cancer. Combined with a continued
public communication campaign, in 1970, 70% of Americans (as compared to
only 41% in 1954) were convinced of the truth of this causal link. Non-smokers
gradually turned the tables against the smokers and the tobacco industry. On the
values-at-stake side, in coining the idea of the ‘right to breathe clean air’ they
successfully borrowed from constitutionally legitimated human rights discourse;
and by imaging non-smokers as innocent victims of others’ harmful habits, they
managed to exploit the sympathy for those involuntarily exposed to external risk.
Second, once structured, the problem lent itself relatively easily to identifying an
interventionist perspective and realistic action plans. From the very beginning
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in 1971, the twin goals of the Group Against Smokers’ Pollution (GASP) were
to ‘get non-smokers to protect themselves’, and to ‘make smoking so unpopular
that smokers would quit’. Moreover, these were actionable goals. ‘Bad behaviour’
was clearly visible; and it was not difficult to blame a conspicuous source, the
tobacco industry. In addition, government could be pressured to take action
through legislative effort, monitoring and penalties, through public information
campaigns like the Surgeon General’s well-known warnings on cigarette packets,
by making public and working spaces smoke free, by restricting access to tobacco
for young people and, moreover, by holding the tobacco industry responsible
through the courts.
In the case of smoking, US policy makers were eventually able to structure and
deal with the public policy problem in a hierarchist way. However, where does
this leave the hierarchist policy maker in dealing with the other three problem
types? Evidently, they will consider every problem structured until proven
otherwise. Consider the way conservatives resisting gun control in the US easily
get away with framing the problem along the constitutional template of ‘the right
to bear arms’; and to discredit regulation as a form of failure-prone interference,
not as a form of state protection, as the pro-gun control liberals would have it.7
Or consider, at the opposite end of the political spectrum, the hopeless effort
by Doctors Against Hand Gun Injury to impose structure on the issue through
medicalisation and professionalisation; normatively, by categorising hand gun
injuries as health risks; and empirically, by mobilising knowledge production and
dissemination ‘rooted in established principles of epidemiology and public health
practice’ (Seltzer, 2002: 19).
Consider also the way hierachically inclined policy makers and analysts in
agencies for parliamentarian technology assessment in European countries
structured the car mobility problem (Hoppe and Grin, 2000). Although there are
many more ways of framing the car mobility problem8 (to be discussed in later
subsections), hierarchists wish to see car mobility as part of an orderly, reliable
and manageable transportation system. In their view, congested roads and traffic
jams are problematic because they create chaos and stagnation. This means that
the system does not efficiently use available capacity to channel traffic streams
through existing traffic infrastructure. Essentially, then, the congested roads or
traffic jam problem is a systems capacity problem, solvable in principle by capacity
expansion – unless it proves technically absolutely infeasible to meet the demand
for mobility and transportation. Because hierarchists by definition choose a
‘helicopter’ or systems perspective, car mobility is reduced to a partial problem
in an overall problem of transport mode selection and substitution. Because they
can be implemented by experts, favourite hierarchist solutions have a large-scale
and high technical-fix character – fast trains, underground transportation systems,
‘mainports’ and so on.
What others see as compelling evidence for the unstructured nature of the car
mobility problem, hierarchist policy makers and analysts can easily define away
as ‘stupidity’ or a self-interest-based, ill-considered opinion. Even if they fear that
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others may be correct in viewing a problem as ‘wicked’ or ‘messy’, they will still
call it temporarily ‘ill-defined’, awaiting more extensive analysis before engaging
in serious solution efforts. They may also belittle the problem’s seriousness, and
rationalise this by giving low weights to problem dimensions like urgency and
estimated effectiveness of policy measures in their fancy alternative/criteria
matrix analyses.
Because they can only deal comfortably with problems whose normative
dimension is not openly contested, and they are used to impose their values
and criteria on others, they are ill-disposed to deal with moderately structured
problems/means. They will either ignore rival value/goal clusters – like the one
that prioritises accessibility to different transportation modes over meeting an
excessive demand for car mobility. Instead, they will implicitly impose their own
values; or, if another hierarchy is too powerful, they will avoid dealing with such
problems or problem parts. If the knowledge and technology base for problem
solving is either insufficient or contested in their own eyes, hierarchists will only
reluctantly deal with moderately structured problems/ends. Technology forcing,
like in the state of California’s zero emission mandates for cars, provides a good
example. By imposing a zero emission target, California forces the car industry
to speed up its R&D efforts for producing zero or extremely low emission
vehicles.This corresponds to a hierarchist policy maker’s preference for improving
the problem’s knowledge base. Simultaneously, it keeps open the possibility for
wielding the hierarchist’s preferred policy instrument – law enforcement.9
Isolates: ‘surviving without resistance’
Isolates experience themselves as outcasts, subjected to a fate determined by dark
forces or far-away ruling circles, both way beyond their influence.We all can easily
think of the isolate as belonging to the contemporary underclass, that is, beggars,
street people, the homeless, teenage prostitutes, drug pushers, addicts, alcoholics,
compulsive gamblers, vandals, small-time crooks, educational drop-outs, poor
single-parent families and all kinds of other groups who live a life of exclusion
at the margins of modern society. It is a way of life not expected to be seen and
heard in public life, let alone policy-making circles. This is why in many policy
studies only the three ‘active’ voices – hierarchy, egalitarianism and individualism
– are heard, and the ‘passive’ isolate appears to be absent.
‘God is high, and the King is far’ is a good expression of the isolates’ state of
mind.They perceive the institutional settings in which they find themselves in one
of two ways. It is inherent in their world-making disposition to see the world as a
lottery, and risk absorption as the most appropriate way of coping with this ‘fact
of life’ (Thompson and Wildavsky, 1986: 280).Transferred to social, organisational
and political relations, these worlds take on the qualities of unstable casinos. Dror
(1986: 168) gives a dramatic description of these conditions:
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where not playing is itself a game with high odds against the player;
where the rules of the game, their mixes of chance and skill, and the
payoffs change in unpredictable ways…; where unforeseeable forms
of external ‘wild cards’ may appear suddenly…; and where the health
and life of oneself and one’s loved ones may be at stake; sometimes
without knowing it.
When isolates believe the unstable casino to be ruled by mere randomness, they
may define the overall institutional environment as anarchy. For example, an
isolate belongs to an anarchic organisation beset with garbage-can-like decision
processes. His organisational function, competence, status, access to decisionmaking arenas and relationships to colleagues are continuously ambiguous, in flux
and unpredictable; and so are the organisation’s relations to its wider environment
(March and Olsen, 1976). Alternatively, in a fatalist variation, he could define the
institutional situation as a barracks, when he believes that the unstable casino is
actually run by an all-powerful but unpredictable human despot or tyrant. He
belongs to a highly rule-bound organisation; but the rules are changing, as are
the conditions under which they apply, and the consequences of breaking them.
Examples would be soldiers at the mercy of a whimsical drill officer, students
dealing with stern but unpredictable teachers,10 or bureaucrats serving an autocratic
ruler, of a traditional monarchical, revolutionary religious or military ‘caudillo’
type (Heady, 1991: 310 ff).
The ‘rationality’ of the isolate and/or fatalist is a gaming or gambling one; it
may also be characterised as inspirational and strategic. According to Dror (1986:
168-9), under conditions of adversity, policy makers resort to ‘fuzzy gambling’.
In its extreme, fatalist form, any decision making is senseless. Surprise dominates,
better intelligence cannot improve ignorance, having goals and values is a luxury,
and non-decisions or incremental decisions make no sense because experience
and past performance have lost their anchoring functions in a highly volatile
environment. In an effort to make the best of it, fatalist policy makers or analysts
could try the policy principle of minmin avoidance, that is, choose a strategy that
prevents the worst outcome, or at least minimises the damage (Dror, 1986: 10).
Frequently, this means avoidance or procrastination of any decisive action. This
fatalist attitude is epitomised in an observation by Chilean President Ramòn Barros
Luco (1910-15), reputedly made in reference to labour unrest: ‘There are only
two kinds of problems: those that solve themselves and those that can’t be solved’
(Wikipedia, 2009). March and Olsen (1976: 12) describe anarchic organisations
as plagued by numerous simultaneous and mutually reinforcing ambiguities:
… ambiguity of intention. Many organizations are characterized by
inconsistent and ill-defined objectives. … ambiguity of understanding.
For many organizations the causal world in which they live is obscure.
Technologies are unclear; environments difficult to interpret. …
ambiguity of history. … What happened, why it happened, and whether
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Cultures of public policy problems
it had to happen are all problematic. … ambiguity of organization.
At any point in time, individuals vary in the attention they provide
to different questions … the pattern of participation is uncertain and
changing.
Given all this, the isolate, fatalistically inclined or more optimistic, will be
predisposed to see any problem as unstructured. Believing that the world is a
lottery and the social world an unstable casino, they will be unwilling or extremely
reluctant to impose any definitive framing on a problematic situation. ‘Survival’
and ‘resilience’ are the isolate’s watchwords (Schwarz and Thompson, 1990; Hood,
1998); they proscribe him/her to have any fixed ideas, let alone entire theories and
explicit methods, about the nature of the problem and how to solve it. Instead, they
must be totally flexible, keep options open in order to be maximally resourceful
and alert at every opportunity to escape fate and grab the lucky number. It is
recognised that this can lead to successful radical innovation. Schmutzer (1994)
views the isolate as the latent source of most social and technological innovations.
Expelled from one of the other ways of life but eager to leave this ‘waiting room
of history’ behind, originality, creativity and true social innovation are the only
way to return to the more established solidarities. March and Olsen (1976: 69ff)
dwell on the possibility of a ‘technology of foolishness’ as a welcome addition to
the standard repertoire, derivable from the unexpected and original ways in which
ideas about problems and solutions get coupled and uncoupled in garbage-can
decision making. Dror (1986: 174) speaks of ‘throwing surprises at history’ in the
sense of adopting radically innovative and inventing quite unexpected options.
Given their primary disposition to see problems as unstructured, isolationists
and/or fatalists tend to turn a blind eye to the occurrence of structured and
moderately structured problems. Hence, they will rely on random search behaviour,
inspiration, maxmax gambling or minmin avoidance11 as problem-coping strategies.
By imposing this frame on problematic situations, isolates produce self-fulfilling
prophecies when confronted with problem definitions of the adherents from
rival solidarities. The result is exclusion from or marginalisation in the halls of
power and civility:
It is at least uncivil and perhaps terminally so, to decline to take
knowledge from authoritative sources…. Persistent distrust therefore
has a moral terminus: expulsion from the community. If you will not
know, and accept the adequate grounds for, what the community
knows, you will not belong to it, and even your distrust will not be
recognized as such. (Shapin, 1994: 20)
Issues of car mobility were mentioned above as typical examples of an
unstructured problem; while in the previous subsection, on hierarchist problemframing strategies, it was shown how policy makers nevertheless frame it as
a structured problem of transportation infrastructure capacity. Senior policy
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The governance of problems
makers in complex bureaucracies for obvious reasons resist the self-image of
‘gambling professionals’, let alone admit ‘fatalist’ problem-definition behaviour
(Dror, 1986: 172). Only a small minority will articulate that economic, societal
and technological developments have strong autonomous evolutionary force,
by definition impervious to governmental steering. Yet, a decade ago, Dutch
environmental policy makers came close for a short while. They declared, first,
that the increasing number of traffic jams was beyond rational policy intervention;
and, second, that allowing traffic jams to grow in number and length of time
delay was their only hope of making the problem disappear by itself! After going
on record with these surprising policy alternatives, politicians, not amused, and
concerned about their public image, summoned them back to more hierarchist
(see above) and individualist problem definitions (see below).
Another example is the fate of the third report on immigrant integration The
Netherlands as an immigration society (2001) by the prestigious Scientific Council for
Government Policy (WRR). In this analysis the WRR reframed the paradigm for
Dutch immigrant integration policies (Scholten, 2008). It described past national
policy as in fact strongly constrained by globalisation and Europeanisation as a
trend beyond the scope of political influence. The Netherlands had become an
immigration society; and hence, the WRR concluded, policies ought to be adapted
to the externally imposed realities; instead of spending immense, but probably
wasted energy in stemming the tide. By following and fuelling strong currents in
public opinion, protagonists of an activist and assimilationist turn in immigrant
integration policy quickly disposed of the WRR advice as too fatalist:
Thought about immigration and asylum has been framed too much
as ‘out of control’. This self-declared impotence has wide-ranging
consequences for our democratic culture. Who considers himself
incompetent in such a vital issue, undermines the idea of national
citizenship. (Scheffer, 2007: 146, translation RH)
A final example, a case of fatalist issue avoidance, is the American gun control issue.
For the neutral observer, here is a clearly unstructured problem. Proponents and
antagonists in the gun control issue have never enjoyed scientific and professional
consensus on ‘gun scholarship’, reflected in a highly divided and divisive public
opinion. On the values-at-stake side, there rages an incessant paradigm battle, in
which the dangerous or protective quality of guns, and the role of government,
remain as divisive an issue as ever, among gun scholars, advocacy groups and the
public at large (Nathanson, 1999; Kahan and Braman, 2003a). In 1995,William J.
Vizzard (1995), a long-time policy analyst and civil servant in federal gun control
policy making, analysed it is a classical example of garbage-can-like processes. Only
after focal events like presidential assassinations,‘cop killer bullets’ or another high
school massacre, for brief periods of time policy windows open up for government
regulatory policy. And although there were numerous initiatives, almost none of
them survived the stage of practical implementation.Vizzard (1995: 346) blames
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Cultures of public policy problems
the policy stalemate on disinterestedness of legislators, and risk avoidance of
bureaucratic staff:
The crafting of effective public policy, absent great luck, requires
significant grasp of … such issues as the mechanics of the firearms
market, the role of firearms in social behavior, and options for firearms
control…. Legislative staffs have spent minimal time mastering such
mundane issues, because legislators show little interest…. [The]
bureaucracy has followed the safest course of action and avoided
association with significant proposals for policy change.
Contrast the issue avoidance by US policy makers with the evidently well-prepared,
swift and decisive policy action by the Conservative(!) Howard Government in
exploiting the 1995 Port Arthur massacre in breaking a similar long-term gun
control impasse in Australia (Van Ecker, 1997).
Enclavists: ‘it’s not fair!’
When one prefers a way of life permitting warm, personal relations with likeminded people and as little interference as possible from outsiders, one joins a
clan, club or commune; even when this means to inhabit an enclave encircled
by a hostile world. In grid-group cultural theory, such people are consequently
called enclavists.The prototypical enclavist way of life manifests itself as a reactive,
absolutist and comprehensive mode of anti-secular religious activism. Enclavism
is not always a preferred way of life; in some cases the enclavist way of life is an
imposed choice, like for Jews in 19th-century Eastern-European ghettos. The
world-making disposition that creates and reproduces enclaves is best described
as groupthink enlarged.
In public policy and corporate management studies, this phenomenon of
combined inside moralism and outside criticism is well known as a threat to highquality decision making in small groups at the top of the pyramid of hierarchist
organisations (Janis, 1982).When groups consist of members with homogeneous
social and ideological backgrounds, have no tradition of impartial leadership, and
perceive their context as threatening or crisis-ridden, symptoms of groupthink
may occur.They are described (Janis, 1982: 244) as an overestimation of the group
through illusions of invulnerability and inherent morality, closed-mindedness
manifest in collective rationalisations and outsider stereotypes, and strong pressures
towards uniformity through self-censorship, illusions of unanimity, direct pressure
on potential dissenters, and self-appointed mind-guards. What is frequently
overlooked in social-psychological analyses of organisational behaviour is that
an enclavist way of life sustains itself by systematically producing the groupthink
cultural bias in society at large. Guarding the group boundaries by picturing the
outside world as evil and mean is the principal way of keeping a group of enclavists
together.This is exactly what the enlarged groupthink symptoms achieve. If they
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The governance of problems
fail, expulsion, always disgraceful and sometimes violent, is the enclavist’s means
of last resort.
The world-making disposition of enlarged groupthink is imbued with a
communicative form of value rationality. It is communicative because verbal means
of persuasion, from public debate to speeches to sometimes vitriolic propaganda
campaigns, are the only allowed means of creating consent in a community of
equals. It is value rational in the sense that normative standards and goal-finding
are the major focus of attention in problem-solving efforts, because the mix of
inside moralism and outside criticism makes enclavists never miss an opportunity
to point out the value conflicts between ‘us’ and ‘them’. The major route to a
solution is that ‘they’ give up their ‘wrong’ values and change their ways accordingly.
Enclavists proselytise, and outsiders should convert to their values and lifestyle.
This assumption of ubiquitous value conflicts leads enclavist policy makers
to structure problems as moderately structured/means. The normative problem
dimension is stressed.This does not mean that enclavist policy makers and analysts
scrupulously survey all relevant and appropriate values. The search is bounded
by the ‘us’ versus ‘them’ dialectic. Opposing ‘our’ values to ‘theirs’ – frequently
attributed on the basis of stereotypes – is sufficient. The same logic breeds close
monitoring of differences between groups in society; particularly differences in
treatment by government.Thus, frequently, the value conflict is shaped as an issue
of distributive justice, equality or (broadly understood) fairness.12 Since the 1980s,
the environmental movement’s and citizen protesters’ major complaint in the
Schiphol Airport expansion issue is that government weighs fragmented benefits
to the population as a whole and concentrated benefits for the aviation-related
business interests higher than the concentrated costs accruing to resident groups
in the airport’s vicinity. In doing so, the fairness problem frame spills over into a
problem of trust in the sphere of interaction and institutional relations.
The enclavist policy maker’s absorption in the value dimension of a problem
is at the cost of its cognitive aspects. Poor information search, and incomplete
search for alternatives and risks of a preferred choice, are typical defects triggered
by groupthink symptoms (Janis, 1982: 243-5). Given the excessive attention to
values, there is a distinct tendency to let ends justify means, irrespective of their
effectiveness, efficiency and even counterproductive side effects. Criticising ‘their’
knowledge base and repertoire of policy instruments is frequently mistaken for a
policy alternative of equal standing. A vivid illustration is Van Eeten’s (1999: 39ff)
policy ‘tale of Riverland’, about the paralysing controversy between experts of the
Dutch Department of Traffic and Water Management and the environmentalist
movement over the flooding problem and dike improvement plans:
The dike improvement argument … is a strong line of reasoning that
in [a] … deductive way derives the required dike designs from the
choice of an acceptable level of dike failure.… [T]he most important
cohesion in the anti-dike improvement protest is that the arguments
are … aimed against the practice of dike improvement. If one examines
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Cultures of public policy problems
the structure of the [environmentalist, RH] argument opposing dike
improvement, it soon becomes clear that this is … a ‘critique’ [or] an
argument that is a point-by-point rebuttal of another policy argument
that has the conventional structure. (Van Eeten, 1999: 54-5)
Enclavistically inclined environmentalists were implicitly accepting higher flood
risks by opposing to the bitter end dike improvement designs by hierarchistically
inclined water engineering experts. The example also shows that enclavists are
prepared go to great lengths to reject problems of the fully structured type and
obstruct its solutions.
How about the remaining two problem types? Regarding moderately
structured/ends problems, one would predict that enclavists frame them as
distributive justice or fairness issues of who gets what, when and how. Invoking
Rawlsian rules like ‘favour the most disadvantaged group’ (see also Chapter Nine),
enclavist negotiators may comfortably, but not very powerfully, participate in
public policy making.13 Given their inclination to ‘critique’, which brings with it a
natural scepticism to non-shared value aspects and strong doubts about the validity
of any knowledge base, enclavists easily join the isolate’s or fatalist’s attraction to
unstructured problems. After all, cultural theory sees egalitarian enclavists as the
natural allies or ‘defenders’ of fatalist isolates as ‘victims’. They share positions on
the negative power diagonal in the grid-group typology because both isolates
and egalitarians have a negative attitude to power. Contrariwise, hierarchists and
individualists have a positive attitude towards power, and happily use it to defend
and strengthen their own ways of life against the others.An ambivalent attitude to
the exercise of power in order to strengthen one’s own way of life puts enclavists
sometimes at a disadvantage in the struggle for power with its two activist rivals.
The way the car mobility problem was framed by several technology assessment
agencies working for national Parliaments in Europe (Hoppe and Grin, 2000)
offers an example of the enclavist’s preferred problem-definition strategy. The
enclavist-egalitarian perspective defines the real issue at stake as equal access
to public space for all. Car mobility is a partial problem of excessive demand,
over-expanded infrastructure, pollution of public space, and violation of health,
ecological balance and quietude of residential areas. Ultimately, the problem is
one of control and cutting back on demand for car mobility, and substitution
with more ‘friendly’, low-tech and small-scale transport modes such as bicycles
and light, zero-emission (electrical) vehicles.
A strong example of the moral overtones in an enclavist and egalitarian problem
definition is the way some framed the AIDS problem, like South-African President
Thamo Mbeki, or Jonathan Mann, former head of the World Health Organization’s
AIDS programme:
A sick society [can] not rid itself of disease…. Discrimination,
marginalization, stigmatization: all heightened vulnerability to HIV.…
The best-demonstrated cofactors were social inequalities…. One
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The governance of problems
account earnestly claimed that, to prevent sexual transmission of HIV,
universal peace had to be attained to end machismo and its attendant
rape; global wealth had to be redistributed to make condoms available
and obviate the need for prostitution; and religious leaders needed to
support nonpenetrative and therefore nonprocreative sex….Tackling
AIDS … required a new conception of social solidarity that redefined
the boundaries between self and other and refused to separate the fate
of few from the many. (Baldwin, 2005: 23)
Individualists: ‘let’s make things better!’14
In the low-group/low-grid cell of the typology one finds the individualist way
of life. In terms of interaction patterns, adherents prefer freely chosen markettype exchange relations to other people. Except in the institutional domains of
economic markets, they find and (re)create spontaneous exchange relations in
social networks. In such networks, individuals easily and flexibly ‘socialise’ with
partners in longstanding friendships or brief encounters, which results in a flurry
of networking activity, with people continuously moving in and out of and
between networks as they see fit. In networking, they live out their world-making
disposition of seizing opportunities for individual, possibly but not necessarily
mutual, benefit.‘Benefit’ here may mean everything deemed meaningful, valuable
or useful, for whatever reason, from an individual’s point of view – ‘from pushpin
to poetry’ in Bentham’s winged words (Mill, 1974: 123).
The individualist type of rationality is functional and strategic. It is functional,
in the sense that the individualist policy maker searches for usable knowledge,
that is, data and information that help them maximise their utility, or at least
satisfice at the self-selected aspiration levels (Simon, 1947). It is strategic, in the
sense that individualists are adept in getting usable knowledge by exploiting their
personal networks. It is ‘the rationality of [a very busy, influential person, RH]
… for shifting the really vital discussions away from the formalised informationhandling system and on to the informal old boy net.We characterize this strategy as
individualist manipulative’ (Thompson and Wildavsky, 1986: 280-1). In a sentence,
the individualist’s basic orientation to problems and problem solving is:‘let’s make
things better; let’s get usable knowledge’.
Given all this, what is a policy problem, so that it may be properly defined
for an individualist policy maker or analyst? Essentially, for a politician or policy
analyst of an individualist bent, a ‘problem’ is an opportunity for improvement.15
Defining a problem is framing it as a choice between two or more alternative
means to seize that opportunity (Dery, 1984: 27). This approach to problem
definition implies some very strict rules of closure. So strict, actually, that to the
egalitarian-minded enclavists and the hierarchist experts, individualist policy
makers frequently appear casual or outright indifferent about many bridgeable
gaps between given and valued situations (Dery, 1984: 26). To begin with, as the
above individualist framing of a problem as a choice between means implies,
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individualists stress means over goals. The individualist policy maker does not
reason from goals to means; but from means to goals. Only those goals are worth
considering for which effective means are available – organisationally, technically
and financially. Feasibility as an overriding criterion in problem definition rules
out many problems as unsolvable or not worth solving.The principal but negative
task of the policy analyst is to point out constraints and determine (in)feasibility
of a policy proposal (Majone, 1978).
Individualists do not care much for explicit value search and goal formulation
anyway. They actually resist political rhetoric, slogans and rallying cries, because
they do not express what actually moves people. In relation to the AIDS problem,
for example, the individualist, voluntarist strategy proved to be an attractive option
to many. Prevention and a technical fix was so appealing precisely because it
sidestepped the need of passing moral judgement on AIDS-related behaviour and
people or groups as carriers of the disease (Baldwin, 2005: 33, 259-60). Preferences
develop with experiencing particular situations over time; therefore, they usually
change and are hard to predict. Rather than ‘deduce’ unambiguous criteria from
lofty but shaky ideals, individualist policy makers express ‘concern’ about ‘threats’,
or ‘ills from which to move away rather than goals towards which to move’
(Braybrooke and Lindblom, 1963: 102). Partly, this ameliorative attitude to the
normative dimension of problems depends on an individualist understanding of
the nature of policy problems as
problems … which [encompass] a host of disparate but interlocked
individual and group problems.… [F]ocusing on a synthetic problem
is no longer a simple situation in which goal achievement is thwarted
but an extremely complex adjustment-of-interests situation.…
[A]ll that can at best be defended as a right ‘solution’ is that a series
of conciliatory moves be made. (Braybrooke and Lindblom, 1963: 55)
Always taking present conditions as an evaluative baseline, individualists limit
their preferences to comparisons of incremental change:
He need not ask himself if liberty is precious and, if so, whether it
is more precious than security; he need only consider whether an
increment of one value is desirable and whether, when he must choose
between the two, an increment of one is worth an increment of the
other. (Braybrooke and Lindblom, 1963: 85)
In this way, the individualist believes that he can safely forgo the vicissitudes of goal
formulation and priority setting. His continuous incremental comparisons have
implicit, contextually shifting policy-preference rankings as a side product. This
largely implicit, ameliorative way of treating values and goals fits the individualist
networking style of political interactions hand-in-glove. Being casual about
political ideology and explicit policy values allows individualist policy makers to
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The governance of problems
see shared interests, concerns and threats easily – even with potential opponents
(see Sabatier and Jenkins-Smith, 1993: 223-5). Likewise, preference aggregation
among many individualist policy makers comes about as an epiphenomenon of
the ongoing partisan mutual adjustment in policy networks (Braybrooke and
Lindblom, 1963: 15; Lindblom, 1965).
On the cognitive side of problems, the individualist policy maker’s instrumental
outlook logically values know-how over know-that.They do not care that much
for scientific or professional expert information and knowledge.They need usable
knowledge (Lindblom and Cohen, 1979), irrespective of its source. Sometimes
the source is scientific or professional inquiry. In the case of tackling AIDS, the
individualist approach that defined liberty as resting on moderation of lustful
behaviour, personal hygiene and latex, had as a necessary corollary fast progress
in developing a preventative or curative vaccine; and made heavy funding of
medical research a must. But more often they rely as much or more on common
sense and practical knowledge of fellow policy makers, civil servants, consultants
and analysts, or ordinary people. Here again, their interaction style helps them
mobilise the usable knowledge or ‘intelligence of democracy’ (Lindblom, 1965)
implicitly stored in their networks.
If a problem should be solvable and worth solving (Dery, 1984: 25-7) according
to the above criteria and rules for closure on the scope and form of a problem,
it follows that the individualist policy maker clearly prefers defining a problem
as moderately structured/ends. But how do they deal with the other problem
types? As soon as they are convinced that a problem is worth solving, and the
knowledge base permits, they will not resist defining a problem as structured. As
in cost-benefit and to a lesser degree in cost-effectiveness analysis, they may even
be at pains to elaborate algorithms and standardised calculation methods that help
them perform their incremental comparisons between means by determining
their monetised costs and benefits to themselves (Weimer and Vining, 1999). But
unstructured and moderately structured/means problems are clearly not worth the
individualist’s precious time. They tie the individualist up in unproductive value
talk or equally unproductive debates about the misery of the human condition.
The individualist would rather avoid both as obstacles to ‘make things better’ – if
only a little bit. In the gun control controversy in the US, for example, individualist
policy analysts typically resist an all-too-moralistic gun control advocacy and join
hierarchist anti-gun control advocates in a call for more ‘dispassionate’,‘pragmatic’
information, evidence, research and a consequentialist type of policy discourse
on what works and at what costs (e.g. Cook and Ludwig, 2003).
The voluntarist-consensual public health approach used in tackling AIDS
is a good example of the individualist’s preferred problem definition strategy.
Public health, in a multicultural society allergic to the slightest form of public
moralising, was supposed to be a problem of self-control, voluntary compliance
and individual responsibility: ‘Every man may be his own quarantine officer’
(John Snow, quoted in Baldwin, 2005: 129). But this clearly depended on every
man’s willingness and ability to digest every bit of usable knowledge provided
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Cultures of public policy problems
by professional, public information and education campaigns, and advocated in
behavioural change strategies.
Technology assessment studies of the car mobility problem also provide us with
examples of typical individualist problem framing (Hoppe and Grin, 2000).They
all define the car mobility problem as threatening free access to roads, and thus to
the individual’s right of freedom of movement.Thus, the car mobility problem is a
lack of space, a shortage of passable roads, a lack of useful traffic information, a loss
of valuable time. Given the total demand for car mobility, the problem ultimately
is undersupply of transport possibilities per car or per car owner. As a choice of
means problem, individualist policy analysts try to find out which alternative road
pricing mechanisms and information systems will rebalance supply and demand
under which conditions.
Conclusions
Cultural bias and problem structuring
Does grid-group cultural theory throw any additional light on questions like:
Why do some political or policy makers prefer to define a problem as Type A
rather than Type B? Can politicians or analysts caught up in the different ways of
life be predicted to have differential affinities and skills in coping with different
problem types? Does grid-group cultural theory somehow organise or synthesise
the disparate and fragmented frameworks and attempts at theory construction in
the emergent subfield of the politics and analysis of problem definition, especially
translation and framing dynamics?
Figure 4.2 summarises the results achieved by bringing grid-group cultural
theory to bear on the problem typology. It shows that there is a rather
straightforward one-to-one match between cultural ideal-types and the policy
problem types. More precisely, each solidarity corresponds closely to one focal
problem-definition strategy.This focal or default strategy is part of a repertoire of
problem-framing and problem-definition strategies. However, each solidarity also
shows a differential set of affinities to non-focal or secondary strategies. For further
theory construction and testing, the secondary strategies are as important as the
focal ones. Remember that we deal with ideal-types and know that reality is
replete with hybrids, and ‘impurities’ are the rule. Particularly, in politically and
ideologically plural societies it is difficult to imagine that politicians and policy
makers of just one cultural disposition hold a monopoly on a policy domain and
its political arena or network. Rather, different coalitions will compete over the
power and authority to define the policy problem, which is to direct and constrain
further policy-making efforts. That is, in order to turn a static problem typology
into a dynamic theory of the process of problem framings and definitions, the
affinities to the secondary strategies in a problem-framing and problem-definition
repertoire determine the possibilities and constraints on building credible advocacy
coalitions (Sabatier and Jenkins-Smith, 1993) or productive discourse coalitions
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The governance of problems
(Hajer, 1995) with adherents of other ways of life. But this is yet another theoretical
and analytical task in linking the problem typology to types of policy making
(see Chapters Five and Six).
Figure 4.2: Cultural bias and problem framing
ISOLATES
HIERARCHISTS
Surviving without resistance!
Structure it!
Focal strategy: unstructured
Focal strategy: structured
Secondary strategies:
structured? (maxmax-win;
minmin-avoidance)
Secondary strategies: weak in
moderately structured problems;
denial of unstructured problems
Let’s make things better!
Focal strategy: moderately
structured/ends
HERMES:
problem
structuring
It’s not fair!
Focal strategy: moderatley
structured/means
Secondary strategies: fair in
structured problems; avoidance of
other problem types
Secondary strategies: biased
in structured problems; fair in
unstructured problems; resistance
to moderately structured/ends
INDIVIDUALISTS
ENCLAVISTS
One way of summarising the results of this chapter is to return to Gusfield. His
cultural analysis of public policy problems stresses the configuration of three
elements that conjoin in the structure of each public policy problem: ownership,
causality and accountability. The theoretical analysis and empirical illustrations
allow the proposition that at least four types of such structures of public policy
problems will be identifiable. Hierarchically inclined policy analysts will opt for the
government or officials as problem owners; they will select the theory of causality
with the highest academic credibility; and they will prefer an accountability
that reflects the ‘one-for-all’ principle (Bovens, 1998). On the contrary, policy
analysts predisposed in isolationist or fatalist ways, believing in ‘survival without
resistance’, will consider everybody, but nobody in particular, as a problem owner,
or rather, victim; every causal theory will be rejected as ‘not of this world’, and
thus discarded in favour of stories and anecdotes about good and bad luck; and
from both previous beliefs and attitudes it follows that when, fully according to
expectations, things go awry, nobody can be held accountable.
Enclavistically predisposed policy makers will claim problem ownership for
‘the people’, ‘the citizens’ or those who demonstrably belong to a worthwhile
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Cultures of public policy problems
target group, for those, in brief, with whom they can identify as a group (‘ours’,
‘of our kind’) or as a person (‘mine’, ‘of my kind’). For them, a malfunctioning
‘system’ always is the root cause of the problem, and in support for this claim they
will appeal to both cognitive authority (counter-expertise) and lay knowledge;
self-evidently it is ‘them’ who are accountable, meaning either evil outsiders or
neglectful superiors – that is, government officials or other authority figures who
represent the collective (Bovens, 1998). For an individualistically programmed
policy maker, the problem owner simply is someone who happens to have the
highest stake, or who for other motives has become deeply involved in solving
the problem; they prefer usable knowledge of whatever kind, which frequently
means – contra Gusfield – that causal knowledge counts but for little; and those
individuals – not groups or collectivities – are held accountable who were in a
position to prevent bad results and damage but failed to do so (Bovens, 1998).
The reader should take note of the fact that cultural theory not just complements
Gusfield’s cultural analysis of policy problems by pointing out predictable
differences between four types of problem structure. The theory also implies
an amendment: it stresses that knowledge remains a vital element in a problem
structure, but that causal knowledge is less important than Gusfield predicts After
all, in three out of four types – individualist, enclavist and isolationist policy makers
– detailed knowledge of causes and effects is unnecessary. Consequently, some even
argue that cultural worldviews much better explain positions in policy translation
and problem framing dynamics, and that these worldviews filter the kinds of
information and information sources believed credible enough to influence one’s
position (compare Kahan and Braman, 2003a, 2003b; Braman et al, 2005).
Spin-offs for doable policy analysis
A logical next question is: do conclusions and findings in this chapter have spin-offs
for doing policy analysis? Is the theory relevant for what-to-do and how-to-do-it
questions of policy analysis? The brief answer is: yes. It teaches analysts precisely
which four problem-definition strategies to expect. It also gives them clues about
which types will confront each other in policy arenas, and which hybrid strategies
are likely and less plausible.This is usable knowledge. Deliberate cognitive problem
structuring by analysts and reasoned problem choice by democratically accountable
public managers, high-level administrators and politicians are indispensable in
avoiding policy controversies and breaking deadlocks (also in Hisschemöller and
Hoppe, 1996; reprinted in Hisschemöller et al, 2001). It involves the confrontation,
evaluation and integration of as much contradictory information as possible. It
leads to what Hannah Arendt (1968: 241) called political judgement through
representative thinking:
The more people’s standpoints I have present in my mind while I am
pondering a given issue, and the better I can imagine how I would
feel and think if I were in their place, the stronger will be my capacity
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for representative thinking and the more valid my final conclusions,
my opinion.
Apart from many social and political conditions, problem structuring requires
policy analysts endowed with skills of problem reframing or ‘the capacity to
keep alive, in the midst of action, a multiplicity of views of the situation’ (Schön,
1983: 281). Precisely at this point, grid-group cultural theory offers inspiration.
Thompson et al (1990) have defended the thesis that at the intersection of grid
and group on the socio-cultural map sits a fifth ideal-type. They call this idealtype the ‘hermit’, because of their self-conscious withdrawal from commitment
to and involvement in the other four ways of life. Schmutzer (1994) stresses free
access and movement between the four cultural biases as another aspect of both
aloofness from and prudent use of the four solidarities. He therefore interprets
the fifth ideal-type as a Hermes, the fast-running messenger and clever translator,
the god of commerce and traffic of the Greeks. Policy analysis needs Hermes-like
practitioners for problem structuring to become an accepted tool of the trade
(Hoppe, 2007).
Notes
Some cultural theorists prefer to speak of ‘solidarities’, because by organising preferred
social relations, they represent different types of solidarity between people.This is true even
for ‘isolates’, who implicitly or explicitly choose this way of life, if only temporarily, like
voluntary soldiers or students. It is perhaps less appropriate for the compulsory isolationism
of the truly marginalised and outcasts, who are indeed condemned to the ‘fatalist’ ways
of life. Nevertheless, I will use ‘way of life’ and ‘solidarity’ interchangeably as synonyms.
1
These terms are intended to be as neutral and ahistorical as possible in order to
facilitate dispassionate comparisons across regions and time. Unfortunately, it is logically
impossible to jump over one’s own constructivist shadow and find a terminology that is
at once technically correct, easily understandable and not burdened (for some readers) by
unintended historical, political or contextual connotations (compare Douglas, 1996b: 175).
2
The army and police come to mind as the prototypical hierarchical public sector
organisations. But, of course, there are numerous other hierarchical institutions outside
of the public sphere. Lakoff (1996) anchors the conservative worldview in the US in the
hierarchical prototype type of ‘strict father’, heading a traditional nuclear family ‘with
the father having primary responsibility for supporting and protecting the family as well
as the authority to set overall policy, to set strict rules for the behaviour of children,
and to enforce the rules. The mother has the day-to-day responsibility for the care of
the house, raising the children, and upholding the father’s authority.’ Lakoff anchors the
liberal, or in cultural theory terms, egalitarian worldview, in another, ‘nurturant parent’
type of family system.
3
118
Cultures of public policy problems
Kenneth Boulding (1956) linked knowledge to ‘faith’, instead of ‘truth’. He argues that
it is the scientist’s or expert’s faith in scientific method that is the kernel of knowledge,
especially the belief that applying knowledge to political and/or organisational decision
and action makes it ‘rational’ par excellence. On top of that, the ‘faith’-character of
knowledge leads to its use in the social formation of shared images and collective beliefs
able to coordinate action.
4
Of course, Rastogi is eccentric, but honest, in explicitly founding his normative position
on religious inspiration. Policy analysts, consciously or not, usually take either a cognitivist
or a non-cognitivist meta-ethical stance. Cognitivism in policy analysis is frequently
identified with Arnold Brecht’s Scientific Value Relativism (or Alternativism). Scientists
cannot scientifically determine whether or not something is ultimately valuable; but ‘given’
an ultimate value, they can use their scientific methods to clarify all the implications and
consequences of adhering to this ‘given’ value. But most policy analysts, for example
cost-benefit analysts and pragmatic incrementalists, adhere to some form of emotive noncognitivism, that is, they deny ethical statements any cognitive status beyond emotional
expressions of ephemeral and temporary preferences. The only thing scientists may do is
observe people’s preferences as manifested in their behaviour, and adopt these ‘observed’
preferences as normative lodestars. Paradoxically, these more scientifically inspired and,
therefore, more frequent meta-ethical positions, in practice, amount to the same hierarchical
bias in favour of experts who claim the right to force-feed their interpretations and
‘empirical’ indicators for values to politicians, policy making officials and citizens (Van
de Graaf and Hoppe, 1989: 141-57; Fischer, 1990).
5
Decomposability is a general characteristic of professional problem solving.
Decomposability pre-formatted by an undubitable, or in practice undoubted, paradigm
distinguishes the hierarchist’s way of problem definition and solving. Compare this to Don
Schön’s reflective practitioner whose hallmark is the ability to simultaneously entertain
more than one alternative way of decomposing problems.
6
Some might object to this argument that hierarchists by implication are supportive of
state control. This overlooks that hierarchists see ‘order’ as overriding value orientation.
Difficult as it may be for Europeans to understand, in the US, ‘order’ was created by
ordinary people resisting French and English colonial powers and their imposed ‘order’.
More than in Europe, US conservatism blends a strong dosage of religiously and historically
inspired hierarchy with a fair amount of ‘state-free’ individualism.
7
For example, Coughlin (1994) analyses the traffic congestion problem in the US as
a ‘tragedy of the concrete commons’ from a traditional economic growth and a green
perspective.
8
That is, if they are convinced that government intervention is the proper thing to do.The
gun control issue proves that, in some cases, hierarchists prefer government to leave other
hierarchically run institutions (like families, churches and certain types of schools) alone.
9
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The governance of problems
Schmutzer (1994), an Austrian scholar, views schools and other educational institutions
as the typical isolationist organisation. Interestingly, March and Olsen (1976) use US and
Norwegian universities and faculties to illustrate their theory of anarchic organisations
and garbage-can decision-making processes.
10
Some might argue that maxmax gambling and minmin avoidance can be viewed as
‘strategies’ for ‘structured’ problems.
11
So strong is this tendency that, in many versions of grid-group cultural theory, enclavists
are called ‘egalitarians’.
12
This may be the reason why, at face value, interest groups are always drawn into using
enclavist-like rhetoric in advancing their cause. Still, there is no necessary positive
relationship between the enclavist frame and interest group behaviour. After all, interest
groups may hold very different cultural biases. A labour union or an interest group
representing the physically challenged may, indeed, espouse egalitarian beliefs. But
a Chamber of Commerce or Rotary Club representative will more likely embrace
individualist beliefs. The impression of a one-to-one connection between the politics
of interest group representation and the enclavist problem frame actually derives from
stolen rhetoric. The contemporary media demand strong policy statements, packaged as
soundbites. This type of communication of group interests will always stress the group’s
cause at the expense of everything else; thereby lending such types of statements the
semblance of pure enclavism.
13
Any similarity with an advertisement slogan of a multinational company is wholly
intentional.
14
The Pareto optimum in cost-benefit analysis – choose the alternative(s) that make at
least one person better off, and nobody else worse off – is the algorithmic form of the
individualist position.
15
120
FIVE
Problem types and types
of policy politics
[T]he identification of the nature of the policy subsystem in a given
policy sector reveals a great deal about its propensity to respond to
changes in ideas and interests. (Howlett, 2002: 237)
Introduction
The previous chapter looked at translation and framing dynamics from the
perspective of the distribution of cultures in society. It inquired into congruencies
of citizens’ ways of life with policy makers’ styles and strategies in problem framing
and structuring. This chapter will deal with policy politics in policy networks. If
policy making is intertwined cogitation and interaction (Wildavsky, 1980 [1979]),
then policy politics is the combination of types of cognitive processes and styles
of interaction, characteristic for problem processing in an issue domain. Policy
politics is the specific mode or style of policy making among the set of political
actors, proximate policy makers, stakeholders, civil society associations and citizens
involved on a more or less continuous basis, and with more or less intensity, in
processing a particular public issue or problem.
The idea of policy or issue domains means that, in a way, a political system at
large becomes a ‘federation of sectors’ (Wildavsky, 1980 [1979]: 73).The incessant
bombardment with demands facing a political system or polity is sorted or
clustered in policy or issue domains.They are components of the political system
organised around apparently similar or affiliated substantive political problems.
These politico-administrative structures effectively couple decision makers to
implementers and citizens, both top down and bottom up, in translation and
framing dynamics of their own. Policy networks create de facto linkages between
those controlling formal governance arrangements and those engaged in the subpolitics of running the normal, day-to-day social or socio-technical practices in
less formal or completely informal arrangements on the ground.
Policy politics is to be distinguished from macro politics at national or international
levels. At the macro-political level, the socialisation and politicisation of conflict
is the essential political process in a democracy (Schattschneider, 1960 [1988]:
138). At the macro level, issues are processed serially, which is a severe restriction
on the number of issues that can be handled simultaneously.The threat of system
overload is omnipresent (Easton, 1965), but held in check by creating relatively
autonomous policy domains. In these domains, many issues can be dealt with
simultaneously, in parallel processing.‘Relative autonomy’ of policy domains means
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The governance of problems
that macro politics and policy politics penetrate each other, with macro-political
constraints more likely to affect policy politics than the other way around.
To the extent that Lowi (1995) was right in claiming that properties of
policies – as temporary, but authoritative problem/solution designs – correspond
to properties of politics, one would hypothesise that different problem types
normally correspond to certain modes of problem framing, information search
and decision making.Thus, this chapter demonstrates to what extent the problem
types create, so to speak ‘behind the backs’ of those involved, their own modes of
governance, types of power arena and types of political process.The chapter pays
special attention to the ways in which policy debate is closed down and opened
up; to how problem types generate or inhibit access to the policy-making arena
for proximate policy makers and other stakeholders, individual citizens among
them; and to how problem types impose or lift constraints on them, for example
through rules for entry into policy networks; and to the ways in which policy
makers and stakeholders may disagree without being excluded from the policy
game.
From a cogitative perspective, policy politics describes a particular governance
space that coordinates the production, dissemination and acceptability of
knowledges for political decisions. ‘Knowledges’ is used in the plural because
normally political decisions have to align different types of knowledge from
different actors: citizens, professionals, bureaucrats and experts.The policy politics
of a certain domain acquires its special character precisely because it implicitly
or explicitly constructs a particular public epistemology, that is, the taken-forgranted expectations about the legitimacy and validity of these knowledges.
Thus, policy politics involves contests about the availability of knowledge, about
powers and competencies to frame and define problems and about the legitimacy
of knowledge claims.
In this chapter, a tentative taxonomy of policy politics is developed by briefly
tracing the history of policy-making theories. It is shown how they have evolved
from models of policy decisions by ‘leaders’ or top levels of organisations to
models of inter-organisational policy networks.This history is then simplified in
four ideal-typical styles of policy politics, each one fitting one type of problem
structure: structured problems have regulatory politics (rule), moderately structured
problems (goals) have a politics of advocacy coalitions and problem-driven search
(negotiation and search), moderately structured problems (means) have a politics
of conflict management and discourse coalition building (accommodation) and
unstructured problems are characterised by either populist leadership politics and
crisis management or serious efforts at learning through deliberation (leadership
and/or learning).
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Problem types and types of policy politics
From policy decision making in and between organisations,
to networks
Historical overview
In Chapter Three, a problem typology based on two dimensions was introduced:
the degree to which multiple policy makers agree on values at stake and the degree
of certainty about relevant and available knowledge.These two dimensions were in
fact inspired by a 50-year-old typology of organisational decision making devised
by Thompson and Tuden (1959). In an effort in heuristic concept stretching, their
typology will be used to create a loose and tentative taxonomy of types of policy
politics. In a way, it will be shown why the Thompson and Tuden typology may
still be regarded as a set of useful meta-types for theorising on the policy process.
But first, the intellectual history of modelling the policy-making process has
to be briefly set out. During and after the Second World War, the social sciences
experienced a turn to social relevance.To prove their value to society and politics,
the social sciences had to address identifiable actors that disposed of the resources
to finance research that was clearly relevant to their actor-specific purposes.
Pragmatically, this meant turning to governmental-public and corporate-private
bureaucracies; conceptually and from an institutional perspective, it meant
establishing public and business administration, and policy and organisation
studies as academic fields, or rather interdisciplinary movements in the social
sciences (Wagner, 2001: 72). This, of course, could be done at several levels of
analysis and from varying epistemological orientations, depending on the type of
actor addressed.1 Broadly speaking, the analytical drift in the history of models
of the policy-making process from the 1950s to the present runs from models of
individual policy makers (by Simon, 1947, 1957, Lasswell, 1930, 1986 and Dror,
1964), to models of organisational policy making (by Allison [1971], Steinbrunner
[1974], Mintzberg et al 1976], March and Olsen [1976] and Kingdon [1984]),
to the present models on policy making as networks, governance, discourse and
deliberation (Parsons, 1995; and especially Howlett and Ramesh, 1998; Hall and
O’Toole, 2004; Bogason, 2006; Klijn, 2008).
This history of policy-making theory may be conceptualised as a development
along two axes. The first axis is the familiar Wildavskian polarity, well expressed
in Wildavsky’s (1980) aphorism ‘speaking truth to power’. All policy making is
an intricate intertwinement of cogitation and interaction. Cogitation implies
thought processes, involving truth, logic, analysis, argumentation, creativity,
design, ingenuity and prudence. Interaction is about processes of collective
will formation, involving power, instigation, manipulation, support building for
majority formation, rhetoric, heresthetics,2 mutual adjustment, and vigilance or
alertness.The second axis is about how the intricately intertwined, yet contrasting,
processes of cogitation and interaction unfold (Bogason, 2006): as imposed
top-down processes of organised order through coordination, or as bottom-up,
muddled, epiphenomenal and emergent processes of coordination-without-a123
The governance of problems
coordinator (Lindblom, 1965) or self-guidance (Lindblom, 1990). If one projects
half a century of theorising on policy making in a property space defined by
these two axes, the result is Figure 5.1.
Figure 5.1: From policy decisions to policy networks
Organised,
top-down
Lasswell
Dror
Simon
Allison
Cogitation
TW
NE
S
RK
O
nc
na
er
v
‘ go
e
’
Interaction
Lindblom
Wildavsky ,
is
e
at iv anal ys
ber
deli ourse
.
di sc
Cohen et al
Kingdon
Muddled,
bottom-up
Striking in this depiction is the solid theoretical tradition of linking interactive
to cogitative styles in policy making, all the way from Simon (satificing by
administrative man) in the 1940s and 1950s, through the work of Lindblom/
Wildavsky (disjointed incrementalism) in the 1960s, Allison (organisational process
and bureaucratic politics models), to Cohen, March and Olsen (decision making
as garbage cans) in the 1970s. Equally striking, however, is that the more recent
network and discourse or ‘governance’ approaches to policy making apparently
have given up on the empirical and normative task of linking network interactions
to cogitation styles or patterns. A governance-of-problems approach as advocated
here aspires to rebalance, however tentatively, the cogitative and the interactive
dimensions in network thinking.
Decision making by leaders, or rank and file
The first step to social relevance was to turn scholarly attention to decision makers
at the top of political and corporate organisations. Setting up authority, and using
expert knowledge in order to create orderly social and material production
processes, was dealt with as a problem of rational leadership. Rationality was
124
Problem types and types of policy politics
considered to be a sequence of logically ordered, transparent and self-conscious
thought movements. This view of rationality resulted in the many sequential or
stage theories of decision and policy making that until this very day dominate
fields such as business administration, public administration, policy analysis and
organisational, even psychological, decision making (see Chapter Two). In political
science, public administration and policy analysis, the works of Lasswell (Lerner
and Lasswel, 1951; Lasswell, 1971) and Dror (1971) are exemplary for efforts at
rationalising policy making based on scientifically enlightened leadership.
But even in those early years there were dissenters and sceptics whose influence
was to grow. They started modelling the decision making and design behaviour,
not of leaders, but of the rank and file. Most famous among those, of course, is
Herbert Simon, who coined and theoretically elaborated the concept of bounded
rationality (see Chapter Three). In order to deal with sometimes quite complex
problems, attention scarcity and limited time, people unavoidably develop
simplifications in the representation of a problem, the number of alternative
solutions considered and the consequences to be taken into account in evaluating
alternatives. Simon himself developed the model of ‘administrative man’; a kind
of middle manager in a large firm, or mid-level official in an administrative
organisation. He finds the (cogitative) constraints on his problem-processing
work closed by the (organisational and interactional) givens of his role and
position in a hierarchical organisation. He follows a design and decision strategy
called ‘satisficing’. Comprehensively rational decision making is impossible in
principle; even optimising is very often impossible for pragmatic reasons. Thus,
most frequently, only those solutions are considered that come up in sequential
search processes, and that attain satisfactory levels of criterion variables (Simon,
1947; 1957).When a satisfactory alternative is found, the search process stops and
the alternative is selected. If satisfactory alternatives come up easy and fast, the
aspiration level for what counts as ‘satisfactory’ is raised. Only when no satisfactory
alternative is found after a long search, more than one alternative at a lowered
satisfactory threshold may be considered.
Thinking along the same lines, but applying them to the context of policy officials
in politicised bureaucratic settings, Lindblom (Braybrooke and Lindblom, 1963;
Lindblom, 1965) modelled policy-making practice as disjointed incrementalism.
The shift in context is important. Lindblom tackles political problems, and officials
in bureaucratic roles, but in thoroughly political settings. This complicates the
task environment considerably, as ‘the human capacity for heuristic reasoning
creates conflict, as well as creating uncertainty, in that it creates new problems and
objectives’ (Grandori, 1984: 204). In these more complex political environments,
policy-making bureaucrats apply a simple strategy of ameliorative incrementalism.
This cognitive strategy may be applied only because the bureaucrats implicitly
trust in the safety nets of normal political interaction: first, the ‘invisible hand’ of
partisan mutual adjustment at work in interest-group pluralism; and second, the
trial and error of the never-ending sequence of policy cycles.Through successive
limited comparisons of alternatives against each other and the status quo as the
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The governance of problems
bottom line, by agreement on limited actions as variations on existing policy, and
by comparing such small moves with existing solutions at the margins, slow but
solid progress can be made.According to Lindblom, in political and policy matters,
step-by-step policy change is a wiser, more error-proof strategy than reaching
for comprehensive rationality and radical change (Lindblom, 1959, 1965, 1979,
1999; Braybrooke and Lindblom, 1963). After all, even ‘[c]apitalism was only a
series of patches on feudalism’ (Dahl and Lindblom, 1953: 86).
It is stressed again that Simon and Lindblom were actually modelling the
decision-making behaviour of non-leaders in different contexts. Maybe this is
one of the reasons why it took so long for their ideas to become fully accepted.
Many academics and politicians believed that leaders at the apex of organisations
might well aspire to and maybe even achieve higher levels of rationality. And
did not leaders exist to break through the complacency, sluggishness, inertia and
conservatism of the rank and file, in order to strive for a more active, rationally
ordered society (Dror, 1964; Etzioni, 1967, 1968)?
Towards contingency in decision strategies
In elaborating incrementalism, Lindblom actually restricted himself to one of four
major strategic aids to ‘rational calculation’ set forth by himself and Robert Dahl
a decade before (Dahl and Lindblom, 1953: 64ff). In addition to incrementalism,
they saw science, calculated risk, and utopianism as alternative overall methods to
deal in politics and governance with problems of information, communication,
large numbers of variables and the complexity of interrelations between them.
For the purpose of this analysis, the most interesting part of Dahl and Lindblom’s
argument is the development of a crude contingency theory of circumstances in
which one design and decision strategy is to be preferred over the others:
Incrementalism is not always satisfactory.… Calculated risks are often
necessary because scientific methods have not yet produced tested
knowledge about the probable consequences of large incremental
changes, small changes will clearly not achieve desired goals, and
existing reality is highly undesirable.… In such situations, the calculated
risk is the most rational action one can undertake – for all alternatives,
including the alternative of simply continuing existing policies, are
calculated risks.… As models, utopias … help one focus on long-run
goals; unaided by the imaginative impact of utopias, incrementalism
might easily degenerate into petty change, fear of the future, a placid
tolerance of existing distress, and an irrational unwillingness to take
calculated risks.… The danger of utopias is not that man has utopias.
It is his use of utopias to blind him to the art and science of rational
calculation. (Dahl and Lindblom, 1953: 85-8)
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Problem types and types of policy politics
But Lindblom and Dahl dropped the fledgling theory of conditions for success
of different decision-making strategies in the daunting field of political and
governance practice. Both opted for a narrower and more manageable focus
on, respectively, incrementalism in pluralist democracies, and democracy in the
framework of comparative political science.Thus, it fell to Thompson and Tuden
(1959) to publish the first self-conscious contingency theory of decision strategies in
the somewhat less complex field of organisation and administrative studies.They
spelled out a theory, descriptive and normative at the same time, on different
conditions or task environments, in which different forms of strategising by
organisational leaders might be called ‘rational’. That is, they tried to specify
conditions under which, negatively, a particular decisional strategy, satisficing say,
would be inapplicable, and, if applied, would render inferior results; and positively,
conditions under which satisficing would be applicable and appropriate in the
sense of generating favourable outcomes. In fact, using later terminology by
Gigerenzer et al (1999), they were packing theories of (bounded) rationality into
a meta-theory of ecological rationality.
In defining conditions or task environments, Thompson and Tuden (1959)
considered the environment as a source of information on values and interests, and
on descriptive and causal knowledge.They used degree of agreement on goals or
ends, and degree of uncertainty about means to achieve ends, as two dichotomised
dimensions to create a typology of four cells (see Figure 5.2). If goals are clear
and there is no or only low uncertainty about the means to achieve them, they
expect (and advise) leaders and their staff to use a computational approach to decide
on the best course of action. If goals are agreed but there is considerable or a lot
of uncertainty about means, they are supposed to use a judgemental approach to
figure out what instruments to use. If, on the other hand, means are pretty certain
but the goals cannot be agreed upon, compromising and bargaining are indicated to
reach common ground for joint action. Finally, if both goals remain contested
and means are uncertain, inspirational decision making and leadership are called
for to move people into action.
It is now clear why the problem typology used throughout this book originates
in the Thompson and Tuden typology.The four types of policy problems basically
correspond to the four cells in their typology of organisational decision making.3
The problem types remain rooted in the Thompson and Tuden typology, but
the types of policy politics to be distinguished later are not derivable from their
types of decision strategies. Computation, judgement, bargaining4 and inspiration
are concepts that suggest modes of cogitation possibly used by chief executive
officers or leaders and their staffs to decide on implementation plans and operating
procedures by their (business) organisations. Later developments have refined both
the concepts of organisations and of their environments.
Yet, many scholars to this day have found it useful and inspirational to adapt
and conceptually elaborate upon the Thompson and Tuden typology. Miller
(1996) demonstrated its usefulness as a meta-theory for organising the literature
on organisational learning; DeLeon (1998) argued the same for systems of
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The governance of problems
public accountability; and Husted (2000, 2007) showed the same for measuring
corporate social performance and dealing with moral problems in business.
Empirically informed models of policy making in the single organisation saw
many new developments (for overview, see Miller et al, 1996) that may similarly
be ordered along the Thompson and Tuden meta-theoretical template. Much
of this literature can be read as a sustained attack on the rational-computational
mode. Quinn (1978) elaborated Lindblom’s theory about public sector policy
making and transformed it into logical incrementalism as a business strategy.
Allison (1971) showed how the Cuban missile crisis could be explained from
alternative perspectives like an organisational process model focusing on standard
operating procedures (see also Steinbrunner, 1974), and a bureaucratic politics
model focusing on the power tactics of agencies in the national political arena (see
also Halperin, 1974). Cohen et al (1972) developed the witty-named garbagecan model, showing that organisations frequently make decisions in settings of
ambiguous preferences, unclear technologies and fluid participation. A decade
later, the idea was picked up, severed from organisational contexts, and applied
by Kingdon (1984) to political agenda-setting and policy-formulation processes.
Meanwhile, studies by Mintzberg et al (1976), Nutt (1984), the Bradbury group
(Hickson et al, 1986) and Hoppe et al (1995) kept demonstrating empirically
the enormous variety of types of decisional processes in private and public
organisations. Efforts to synthesise this huge scientific output typically hark to
the Thompson and Tuden scheme as meta-theoretical organiser (e.g. Choo, 1998:
171). Figure 5.3 is a reproduction of Stacey’s (1996: 47) synthesis of the field (from
Rooney et al, 2003: 79). In a Thompson and Tuden property space, Stacey groups
12 modes of decision making in five types of contexts.
Figure 5.2: Four types of decision rules
Far from
certainty on
required and
available
knowledge
Unstructured
problems:
inspiration
Moderately
structured problems
(goals): judgement
Moderately
structured problems
(means): bargaining
Structured
problems:
computation
Close to
certainty ...
Far from
agreement ...
Source: Adapted from Thompson and Tuden (1959)
128
Close to agreement on
norms and values at stake
Problem types and types of policy politics
Figure 5.3: Stacey’s use of Thompson and Tuden’s typology as meta-theory for
mapping theoretical developments in organisational decision making
Far from
agreement
4
5
Garbage-can
decision making
Disintegration and
anarchy or massive
avoidance
Brainstorming and
dialectical enquiry
Intuition
2
Political decision
making and control;
compromise,
negotiation, dominant
coalitions
Unprogrammable decision making
– ‘outcome’ rather than solutions
Technically rational decision making
and monitoring form of control
Close to
certainty
Search for error
Identification, development and selection
Agenda building
3
1
Close to
agreement
Muddling
through
Judgemental decision making
and ideological control;
logical incrementalism
Far from
certainty
Source: Stacey (1996: 47)
Prescriptive implications
From a normative point of view and equally important for the purpose of
this analysis, Grandori (1984) demonstrated how alternative decision strategies
like satisficing, incrementalism, (cybernetic) feedback on day-to-day standard
operating procedures, science, and random responses, each had their own place
in the typology’s logic. Dunn (1988) normatively reformulated the theory of
contingent forms of rationality as a principle in policy analysis. He argued that
too many policy analysts cope with the ‘wilderness’ of ill-structured problems
through conventional methods of policy analysis suitable only for well-structured
problems. Instead, analysts ought to acknowledge the principle of methodological
congruence: the appropriateness of a particular type of method is a function of its
congruence with the type of problem under investigation.
More recently, Paul Nutt (2002) showed the topicality of this prescription. Using
a database of 367 cases drawn from strategic decision making in organisations in
the public, private and third sectors, he found that leaders violated the congruence
principle in six out of ten cases, thereby dramatically lowering their chances
for success. Paparone and Crupi (2005/2006) wrote that the US Department
of Defense violates the principle of methodological congruence. In their view,
the global war on terror cannot be fought well as long as policy analysts are
‘addicted’ to methods of operations research and systems analysis, suitable only
for well-structured problems. In addition, at the US Department of Agriculture’s
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The governance of problems
Forest Service, adaptive management is advocated as the right way to deal with
the uncertainties and ambiguities that the ecological challenge brings to forest
management (Stankey et al, 2005).
Policy making in and through networks
Not only theories on intra-organisational decision making blossomed, so did
theories on inter-organisational relationships. Thompson and Tuden, of course,
also looked at an organisation’s environment. However, they took the focal
organisation as the unit of analysis and considered its exchange partners as sources
of information. In contrast, the inter-organisational approach focused on more
aggregate fields as the unit of analysis. For example, research zoomed in on the set
of organisations engaged in some form of service delivery in a town or region, as
they were considered to exhibit a societal trend towards ‘functionally differentiated
sectors whose structures are vertically [more than horizontally, RH] connected
with lines stretching up to the central nation state’ (Meyer and Scott, 1992: 139).
In public policy studies, this work on inter-organisational relationships was
quickly integrated into research and theory on policy implementation (for
an overview, see Hill and Hupe, 2002). The trend in social science theory and
research (Börzel, 1998; Klijn, 2008) to conceptualise increasing social complexity
as ‘governance through networking’ between organisations of all institutional
domains (public, private, third sector) perfectly matched the holistic ideal in
public policy studies (Nelson, 1996). In one of the first books to use the network
concept to study collective action and decision processes, entitled Interorganisational
policy-making: Limits to central coordination and control, Fritz Scharpf (1978: 346)
expressed this tendency well:
It is unlikely, if not impossible, that public policy of any significance
could result from the choice process of any single unified actor. Policy
formation and policy implementation are inevitably the result of
interactions among a plurality of separate actors with separate interests,
goals, and strategies.
Social scientists have been ambivalent about the almost unchecked growth of the
network concept since the 1980s. Some consider it a particularly apt descriptive
and analytical device for our late-modern type of society (Castells, 2000), while
others criticise it as just another hollow metaphor (Dowding, 1995; Börzel, 1998).
Although the jury is still out, policy network research and theory have delivered
insights that are important for a perspective on the governance of problems and
problem structuring (especially Howlett and Ramesh, 1998; Howlett, 2002;
Bogason, 2006; Klijn, 2008). The most important one is that policy networks
matter. Policy network theories specify properties such as network membership
and mode of interaction that appear to affect the articulation of values, interests,
goals, ideas and knowledge in public policy making. The theories also suggest
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Problem types and types of policy politics
propensities of different types of networks to be tuned to specific forms of
collective ‘puzzle work’ leading to different types of policy change. In the
following, these insights will be discussed with particular reference to problem
structuring. They are listed in Table 5.1.
Closed, institutionalised networks, or policy communities
Empirical evidence from both the US and the UK focusing on who is actually
involved in public policy making has suggested a simple dichotomy between
closed and open policy networks (Börzel, 1998). It could be shown that, in
technical policy areas such as chemical or toxic substance regulation, or in policy
domains where the state tries to regulate particular branches of economic activity
(industry, agriculture), there exist small policy ‘communities’, ‘sub-governments’
or ‘iron triangles’. The last of these terms aptly characterises the closed nature of
a continuous, triadic interaction in policy making between bureaucrats in state
agencies, politicians in congressional or parliamentarian (sub)committees and
lobbyists working for organised groups at federal or national level. Influential
pressure groups with strong lobbies are Pattern A groups par excellence (Edelman,
1964), with vested interests and generally accepted expert knowledge.
Through their continuous interaction and mutual adjustment of political
positions and perspectives on the world they jointly regulate, this small subset of
authoritative and proximate policy makers develop a strong consensus on major
policy beliefs, often resulting in one hegemonic belief system that informs dayto-day decisions. Closed membership of the policy network also means practical
insulation from the dynamics of macro-political, electoral trends or mediagenerated issue hypes. Such insulation frequently is conditional, or mandated:
for as long as they tolerate it, or during set periods, politicians invite bureaucrats
and technocrats to ‘run’ the network for them. When statutes expire, or the
bureaucratic, scientific or corporate network actors deem statutory powers and
authority too weak, they may resort to national Parliaments for legislating stronger
or longer-term mandates. However, under normal conditions this is ’not done’
because ‘political bickering drives out good policy’.
Frequently, such closed networks privilege the role of knowledge in policy, and
suppress the political element inherent in policy making. Since problem structure
is fixed for a long time, scientists can play their favourite role as problem solvers
(Hisschemöller et al, 2001: 447-9). They are an epistemic community (Haas,
1990) of ‘guardians’ (Hisschemöller, 1993), who have specialist or professional
knowledge about the technical and regulatory policy area. These scientists or
professionals have roles such as process managers, engineers, model-designers and
-constructors, or inspectors and monitors. They are either directly employed by
state agencies, inspectorates or public R&D agencies; or indirectly employed by
the state in quasi-autonomous, sometimes commercial, sometimes university-based
laboratories and research institutes (Hisschemöller et al, 2001: 447-8; Ravetz,
2001: 488; Halffman and Hoppe, 2005).
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Table 5.1: Properties of policy networks relevant to problem structuring
Network type
Closed,
institutionalised
Open,
emergent/
decaying
Oligopolistic
competition,
institutionalised
Designed,
established/
terminated
Number of
actors
Small
Large
Restricted, but
open
Restricted
Actor
configuration
Community, subgovernment, ‘iron
triangle’, Pattern A
groups only
Issue network,
coalitions of
convenience, policy
entrepreneurs,
Pattern A and
many Pattern B
groups
Advocacy
coalitions, pluralist
or neocorporatist,
Pattern A groups
mainly
Discourse
coalitions, principle
issue networks,
representatives of
selected Pattern B
groups
Relation to
macropolitics
Mostly insulated
Exposed
Moderately
insulated
Temporarily
insulated
Type of
knowledge
actors
Epistemic
community
of inspectors,
monitors,
engineers,
modellers
Citizens, critical,
and sensitising
scientists; advocacy
scientists
Experts, advisers,
lawyers, process
managers,
consultants,
advocates
Crisis/process
managers,
mediators,
specialists, critical
scientists
Type of
boundary
arrangement for
science–politics
interaction
Knowledge
privileged:
technocracy and/
or bureaucracy
Politics privileged:
advocacy or
enlightenment
Pragmatic:
engineering,
advocacy,
bureaucracy
Pragmatic: coping,
discourse coalition
formation
Number/
dominance of
belief systems
Hegemonic
Many
Dominant, but
disputed
Contested, but
depoliticised
Type of policy
making
Rational-analytic
problem solving
Garbage-can-like
problem and
goal finding; and/
or dramaturgical
incrementalist
problem solving
Partisan mutual
adjustment, and
incremental
analysis for
goal setting and
problem solving
Deliberative
and procedural
accommodation of
conflicting goals,
conflict/problem
avoidance
Type of learning
Analysis/
Variety/selection
Interactive and
instruction learning learning; hoping for institutional
synthesis
learning
Interactive,
organising for
synthetic learning
Network
management
Strong, hierarchical Impossible to weak Moderate
Strong, if possible
Type of policy
Information and
rule-driven
Symbol-driven
Incentive-driven
Discourse-driven,
deliberative,
procedural
Potential policy
change
Slow, incremental;
rationalising
breakthrough
Rapid, radical
but symbolic;
calculated risk;
non-decision
Slow or fast,
incremental
Slow, radical;
symbolic; nondecision
The boundary between science/profession and politics is institutionally arranged
as a mandate to bureaucratic government or ‘invited’ technocracy (Hoppe, 2005).
Such arrangements result in a policy-making style that participants themselves
consider a close approximation of rational-analytic problem solving. This shared
conviction about the best way of making policy allows for strong, hierarchical types
of network management.The when, how and why of participation by particular
sets of professionals and experts in the decision- and policy-making process is
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Problem types and types of policy politics
not politically contested. It frequently takes the form of an allegedly unilinear
process of knowledge transfer and use: from experts and analysts, to policy analysts
who, in a mediating role, ‘translate’ scientific findings into policy arguments for
those who formally take policy decisions but most of the time just follow advice.
Knowledge in the form of policy-oriented learning definitely precedes policy
action. Policy-oriented learning is defined here like in Sabatier (1999: 123), as
‘relatively enduring alterations of thought or behavioral intentions that result
from experience and/or new information and that are concerned with the
attainment or revision of policy objectives’. In closed policy networks run by
experts, it frequently has the character of analysis/instruction learning. First,
it is structural, that is, methodical through an agency’s experience in standard
operating procedures. Second, it is analytical, through systematic, intense, preferably
experimental or quasi-experimental, sometimes simulated modes of information
gathering and new knowledge production. Finally, it is instrumental, mostly
concerned with more effective and efficient means for goal achievement.
The small set of network actors engaged in rational-analytic problem solving
and analysis/instruction learning just ‘knows’ that its task environment is relatively
stable, tends to equilibrium and thus is predictable. The policies they produce
are rule driven, that is, they are of the type ‘if x is the case, then do y’, and so on.
However, both the observation of ‘x’ and the implementation of ‘y’ may have a
complex, very technical nature. Rules promulgated in official policy guidelines are
likely to change only slowly, and in incremental ways. Long-term policy change
is now generally believed to follow a punctuated equilibrium (PE) model of long
periods of incremental change and short, sudden bursts of radical policy innovation,
in the longer run tending to new incremental equilibrium (Baumgartner and
Jones, 1993, 2002). The small, closed policy network described here creates and
holds a monopoly over the problem definition. Because it successfully resists the
entry of new proximate policy makers, the stable, small set of core policy makers
can also resist learning about new images, framings and definitions of the policy
problem and new ideas about its solution.
Thus, closed policy networks resemble ‘communities’, and thrive on stable,
well-structured policy problems at the heart of their belief system. The closure
on membership partly even depends on closure in the definition of the problem.
Closed networks that resemble technical or professional ‘communities’, and engage
in modes of regulatory policy, create and prolong the long periods of equilibrium,
and resist the punctuations in the PE model of policy change. Of course, in
theory, problem-solving technical communities may realise truly innovative
policy breakthroughs in the long run. In reality, such non-incremental leaps are
never realised by the ‘same’ policy community. They require strong, competing,
expert-like communities, which are frequently part of other types of (non-policy)
networks, before invading and taking over closed policy communities.
Here we see a first glimpse of an insight that will occupy us later at greater
length: the types of policy networks coexist, overlap, impact on each other, and
(co-)evolve over time.Therefore, strategically minded and entrepreneurial policy
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The governance of problems
makers sometimes have a choice between them, or an opportunity to disorganise
and dismantle one, and mobilise, organise or nurture another. As substantive policy
does change, so does the policy network – and vice versa.
Open, agonistic, emerging or decaying issue networks
In the beginning stages of network theory development, closed policy networks
had open issue networks as opposites. Such issue networks were open to many
societal actors as candidate proximate policy makers next to the conventional
bureaucratic and political players and representatives of vested interests. Although
most of the time there is a longstanding core policy community, in open issue
networks political access and membership are possible for typical Pattern B
groups (Edelman, 1964), that is, groups of people with high anxiety levels and
only stereotypic information about a policy issue. It is exactly because they feel
they have a stake in the issue, but little information about it, that they can be
mobilised, either through the media, or by clever policy entrepreneurs representing
organised citizen associations (like the US Group Against Smokers’ Pollution
[GASP]), or social movements (like the Dutch Stichting Milieu en Natuur [SMN],
or Foundation for the Benefit of the Environment and Nature), or public interest
lobbying groups with letterhead, credit card membership and charity funds (like
the Dutch Vereniging voor Natuurmonumenten [Association for Nature Monuments]).
Such associations or clubs frequently have or can mobilise counter-expertise
to compete with the policy community’s core policy makers. The easy in and
out of sometimes not-so-proximate policy makers makes for rather accidental
issue networks, and equally short-lived coalitions of convenience between
stakeholders who find it in their interest to collaborate. Open issue networks are
also much exposed to macro-political developments: frequent issue reframing
for political mobilisation and creating a bandwagon effect. Parties with high
stakes in the issue try to mobilise many others to enter the network as allies,
even if the price is bending the original framing of the issue this way or that.
Due to this political dynamics in issue networks, stable problem framings that
pre-structure authoritative problem definition are almost out of the question.
Each new participant is likely to bring to bear his own worldview, belief system,
social myth, religious or ethnic perspective, or simply group interest to bear on
the issue. The number of belief systems in the policy issue area is large, with
multiple belief systems vying for dominance in rather chaotic processes.5 Issue
networks breathe an atmosphere of political strife, adversarial debate and agonistic
participation. Strikes, sit-ins, demonstrations, inflammatory speeches and other
forms of political agitation, propaganda and power struggle aimed at mobilising
masses of people (rather than arguments or money) are normal.This may lead to
situations where charismatic inspiration by leaders and populist politics are seen
as the main vehicle to frame inherently unstable issues into structured problems.
Although open issue networks certainly privilege the political over the cognitive
element in policy making, this is not to say that issue networks are devoid of
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Problem types and types of policy politics
players who try to bring knowledge to bear on the issue. In open issue networks
around unstructured problems, scientists may play the role of problem finders and
clarifiers (Hisschemöller et al, 2001: 253-4). Some scientists and scholars define
themselves, not as guardians, but as public intellectuals, or as responsible citizens
with a special kind of expertise for the public interest. Certainly, when an issue
is not (yet) recognised by the politically interested as salient enough for public
attention or public agenda status, sensitising scientists have a role to play. Perhaps
the most well-known example is Rachel Carson, who wrote Silent spring in
1962, and is widely credited for launching environmentalism as a serious public
issue all over the West. Local citizen groups that feel duped by government or
corporate actions – like in the famous Love Canal or Seveso industrial toxicity
scandals – are sometimes helped through scientific reports by citizen scientists
to get their claims recognised by the authorities. In addition, sometimes critical
intellectuals, through op-eds and other forms of debate in the media, may shock
public opinion into awareness of a public issue.
In the US particularly (Rich, 2004), more recently followed by Germany
(Strassheim, 2007: 281), numerous ideology- and issue-driven think tanks are
continuously feeding public debates and political decision processes by taking an
advocacy role to certain group interests. But issue networks do not have many
institutionalised boundary arrangements between science or professions and the
world of politics and policy.To the extent that they contribute to stepping up the
political salience of an issue, this may be knowledge driven in a pure enlightenment
attitude, where the scientist does not feel actively responsible for how their ideas
are picked up by the public or by proximate policy makers. More frequently, the
scientist’s intention is to have an advocacy role; and provide interest groups with
argumentative and intellectual ammunition in their political struggles (Weiss,
1980; Hoppe, 2005).
Thus, the policy-making style in issue networks is characterised by the fluid
participation, ambiguous preferences or goals, and unclear ‘technologies’ in chaotic
political processes, typical for garbage-can-like decision-making situations. Hence,
any effort at process management is almost bound to fail; although clever policy
entrepreneurs may, from time to time, succeed in forging more or less effective
coalitions of convenience. In the case of truly agonistic and agitating populist
politics, process management boils down to crisis management and political
‘fire fighting’. To the extent that policy-oriented learning is discernable in issue
networks, it is interactive and local-experimental. It is interactive in the sense
of an emergent, spontaneous type of learning-through-debates between the
leading personalities of issue network participants. It is experimental in an equally
spontaneous, but atomistic and ad-hoc way. Experiments emerge as opportunistic,
remedial actions to local problems. In contrast to the controlled, instruction/
analysis type of learning in policy communities, open issue networks display a
variety/selection type of learning process, as in random-evolutionary processes.
Sometimes, clearinghouses or other forms of internet-assisted knowledge and
learning centres may be organised between local stakeholders or chapters of
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The governance of problems
social movements. Always, the intention is that emergent, interactive and localexperimental learning will somehow spark off the creative leap into synthetic
learning. This is a type of learning that reframes an unstructured problem into a
novel kind of structured problem, amenable to collective action through new
sensible modes of problem decomposition and subsequent solving of partial
problems. In other words, entry of new actors may be a necessary condition
for interactive and experimental learning leading to non-incremental policy
innovation. Only linked up to synthetic policy learning, sufficient conditions are
present.
This insight brings to light the superficiality in much current theorising on the
advantages of open as opposed to closed networks (Howlett and Ramesh, 1998:
474, table 5, following Baumgartner and Jones, 1993). Most authors posit rapid,
radical or paradigmatic policy change as the probable result of access of new, highly
motivated policy actors in issue networks. But open policy issue networks are far
from guaranteed policy innovation machines: ‘there is a large difference between
bursts of attention to issues that previously lacked salience and genuinely nonincremental change’ (Hayes, 2001: 96). For one thing, their character as garbage
cans may as well predispose issue network policy making to random decisions that
in the longer run just mean stalemate. For another, their capricious long-term
developments often result in implicit or explicit non-decisions.6 Another possible
result of issue network politics and policy making is a policy of calculated risk.
Policy makers may strongly disagree about desirable end states, and may also
be lacking in certain knowledge about how to achieve them. They may still be
agreed in their rejection of a continued current state of affairs.Welfare dependency,
demographic change and the long-term tax burden brought politicians of both
Right and Left to take the calculated risk of experimenting with individualising,
more market-type welfare reforms, both in the US (Hayes, 2001: 123-47)7 and
in Europe (e.g.Visser and Hemerijck, 1997).
Yet another possibility is for issue network policy making to result in merely
symbolic reassurance, or ‘words that succeed and policies that fail’ (Edelman, 1977).
Citing evidence from the 1970 Clean Air Act and the Nuclear Freeze movement
in the US, Hayes (2001: 72-98) demonstrates a front-and-back-office flip-flop of
‘dramaturgical’ incrementalism as another possible outcome of issue network policy
making. On the one hand, official policy makers give in to an alarmed public
opinion and a majority of challenging groups. This they achieve through ‘frontoffice’ symbolic non-incremental policy change, which is the result of policy
escalation leading to legislation beyond budgetary and/or technical capacity.
Simultaneously, and on the other hand, elaboration and implementation of
formal policy is steered into alternative venues of decentralised, state or local
policy making. The waning of public arousal over time, and the dominance of
the ‘usual suspects’ in such networks, makes for the partisan mutual adjustment
that assures tapering down from the optimal to the feasible in processes of normal
incremental policy making.
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Problem types and types of policy politics
The occurrence of dramaturgical incrementalist policy making and its resulting
symbolic outputs once more demonstrates that politicians and policy makers
sometimes have a choice or an opportunity for combining or shifting between
types of policy politics. Suffice it to say here that open issue networks more
often than not cannot succeed in processing unstructured policy problems into
successful, feasible forms of collective, organised action.They remain locked into
a populist type of politics, with agonistic, highly adversarial modes of ad-hoc
participation by sometime proximate policy makers. Often, crisis management
is necessary to keep conflicts within non-violent bounds. The most that can,
perhaps, be expected is some accumulation of variety/selection learning about
unstructured problems in emerging policy networks. Only if such learning leads
to a transformation of the policy network itself, and the emerging network turns
out to have the staying power to get institutionalised, successful policy action is
brought nearer. Contrary to many superficial interpretations of the punctuated
equilibrium model of policy change, entry of new actors by itself is perhaps a
necessary, but not a sufficient condition for non-incremental policy change.
Competitive advocacy coalitions in oligopolistic, institutionalised policy
subsystems
A third type of policy network is not closed or open to new proximate policy
makers, but is half-open, or oligopolistic. It is closed in the sense of restricting
membership; it is open in that it does not exclude entrance for new, serious
competitors. However, new players need to pass a kind of admission test. They
need an indisputable stake in the issue; they ought to show sustained and willing
attention to the policy issue; they need the skills of recognised expertise; and
their contributions to policy debates should be (most of the time) sincere and
honest (Fox and Miller, 1995: 118-27).8 Under these or similar conditions, new
stakeholders may get access to well-delineated, mature (Sabatier and Jenkins-Smith,
1993) or institutionalised policy subsystems. Examples are well-institutionalised
policy domains concerned with socio-economic policy, educational policy, social
welfare policy, environmental policy, or traffic and transportation policy.
Usually, stakeholders and other proximate policy makers are recruited into the
two or three longer-standing advocacy coalitions in such a policy subsystem.
Coalitions come about because policy actors are aware of basic congruencies in
their policy belief systems; and on this basis decide to pool resources and coordinate
strategic policy influence. Advocacy coalitions attempt to influence the goals,
instruments, budgets and personnel for government policy making in their own
direction. In pluralist (US) subsystems, advocacy coalitions come about because
parties (sufficiently) agree on basic policy assumptions (Sabatier and JenkinsSmith, 1993); in neo-corporatist (‘European’) subsystems, continued strategic
coordination of policy action – for example between employers’ associations and
trade unions in socio-economic policy; or between school administrators’ and
teachers’ associations in education policy – may be founded on the procedural
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The governance of problems
belief that the benefits of compromise ‘under the shadow’ of state intervention
structurally outweigh advantages of building strong and lasting counter-coalitions
(Visser and Hemerijck, 1997; Börzel, 1998). Although institutionalised policy
subsystems are relatively autonomous from macro politics, international and
national political developments bear much more heavily on the constraints and
opportunities of advocacy coalition behaviour than in closed, technical policy
communities.
The functioning of institutionalised policy subsystems depends on processes of
partisan mutual adjustment between members (Lindblom, 1965; Scharpf, 1997).
These are political processes, where practitioners’ information and knowledge
count as much as or more than professional and academic expertise. More than
previously, such processes are organised, moderated or managed by people inside
and outside bureaucracy who describe themselves as process managers, facilitators,
fixers or reticulists (Klijn, 2008). Policy subsystems often also have institutionalised
boundary arrangements between knowledge and policy functions. Expert
organisations usually are very applied or problem driven, but have a pragmatic,
dialogue-stimulating function, meant to support consensus or compromise
building in the partisan mutual adjustment stream.
Expertise may have the form of advocacy advice, like the study centres affiliated
with employers’ associations and trade unions (Hisschemöller et al, 2001: 449-51);
of outsourcing studies to commercial consultants employing a (social) engineering
type of academic researchers or advisers; or in-depth studies, annual reports and
advice produced by quasi-autonomous advisory bodies affiliated to government
(like the Dutch Bureau for Economic Policy Analysis; CPB) or Parliament (like
the British Parliamentary Office of Science and Technology; POST).They are
founded for the purpose of long-term policy-oriented learning and feedback.
Not infrequently, national or subnational government agencies have their own
look-out or knowledge centers, where knowledge brokers manage and disseminate
the incoming stream of information from the other policy subsystem actors
to relevant units. Boundary arrangements of the advocacy, engineering and
learning types all eventually have the function of bolstering or undermining the
dominant policy belief system of the advocacy coalition in power. Learning takes
place interactively in the give-and-take of adversarial, but compromise-oriented
debate. As convincingly argued by Sabatier and Jenkins-Smith, such learning is
instrumental most of the time; second-order learning across belief systems of
different coalitions about adjustments in policy goals, values or higher-order
principles and assumptions is not excluded, but only occurs under the spur of
exceptional circumstances (Sabatier and Jenkins-Smith, 1993: 48-55) .
Actor configurations of advocacy coalitions and boundary arrangements for
instrumental learning generate a mode of policy making fit for moderately
structured problems with a fair degree of goal consensus. Moderate degrees of
goal consensus are likely because, in their mutual bargaining and adjustment,
policy actors share a meliorative approach to goal finding: gradually moving
away from a problematic situation or process (Braybrooke and Lindblom, 1963).
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Problem types and types of policy politics
This ‘negative’ way of problem finding uncovers agreed constraints on ends, but
is no incentive for truly consensual and committed ‘positive’ goal setting and
formulation (Hoppe, 1983). Hence, there will remain some ambiguity and political
distance around policy goals, which is typical for the cautious policy problem
framing in this kind of policy subsystem. Incremental analysis proceeds through
successive limited comparison of alternatives and the status quo to solutions that
are considered marginal improvements. Policy design and formulation usually
precede policy legitimation; proposal selection is a bargaining process of tapering
down from the optimal to the feasible and politically acceptable (Hayes, 2001).
The result commonly is (dis)incentive-driven policies that bring about slow or
fast, but incremental change.
Summarising, institutionalised, oligopolistic policy subsystems are characterised
by advocacy coalition politics, incremental analysis, problem-driven search and
instrumental learning.This generates and maintains moderately structured problem
frames; but in spite of vacillating goal preference, incremental analysis permits
identification of politically acceptable, although marginally effective and efficient,
policies. Institutionalised policy subsystems embody the narrow political margins
of normal democracy.
Discourse coalition building in designed networks
The open issue and oligopolistic subsystem types of policy networks come about
in processes of spontaneous evolution and institutionalisation. Like the closed
policy community, the fourth type of policy network is clearly the conscious
product of political architecture. It emerges when political and policy actors on
both sides of an issue, usually after long stretches of bitter combat and controversy,
come to realise that their predicament may end in serious, potentially harmful
conflict. Both those in power and the challengers have a point, but the issue is
really divisive in a conflictual way. For quite some time they may have hoped
that a stroke of brilliant leadership would miraculously transform controversy and
stalemate into a ‘tamed’ problem, back into normal policy-making procedures. But
sooner or later it dawned on them that: ‘The muddled middle is often muddled,
not because it is composed of morons, lunatics, or unprincipled opportunists but
because it is composed of people trying to reconcile conflicting principles and
commitments that are all quite legitimate’ (Mansbridge, 1986: 192).
Under such conditions, some policy actors may decide to bring together a
new network of a selected, restricted number of proximate policy makers, some
of them as representatives of groups outside normal venues of policy making.
Contrary to issue networks’ spontaneous processes of garbage cans, dramaturgical
incrementalism and variety/selection learning, institutional design is the catchword
here. The design is for building of discourse coalitions9 between participants
with different, sometimes diametrically opposed, belief systems. The design is
for interactive learning aiming for synthesis, or some other means for turning
divergent views and mutual criticism into opportunities for policy change (Roe,
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The governance of problems
1994;Van Eeten, 1999). In case synthesis and change are a ‘bridge too far’, design
is for modest ways of deliberative and procedural accommodation of conflicting
values, principles and goals, like finding means for credible conflict management
and pacification, or gaining time to avoid solving the problem immediately,
without losing trust and legitimacy of citizens. Clearly, designed networks for
discourse coalition formation need strong network management, in both their
creation and maintenance.
In order to build institutional crosswalks, such orchestrated networks have to be
moved out of the political spotlight. At least for a while, policy actors have to be
insulated from normal political processes and public scrutiny, where accountability
is measured in terms of consistency with previous positions, not creativity and
ingenuity in coming to new insights and agreement. The turn from political
contestation to deliberation, and the gestation of new ideas in a learning exchange
of views, needs periods of depoliticisation. Frequently, scientists are called upon to
assist in discourse coalition building. They can play the role of crisis and process
managers; as specialists or critical scientists they may clarify concepts and values
due to their normally larger repertoire of factual knowledge, theories, assumptions
and perspectives; and some scholars make excellent mediators (Hisschemöller et
al, 2001: 451-3).
If successful, deliberative and procedural accommodation leads to policies that
allow actors to cope with, not solve, the problem without damaging the network
and public trust. Usually, policies have an information-driven, symbolic or
procedural character. However, accommodation politics is a risky strategy. In the
best of cases, potential policy change is quite radical or innovative, although perhaps
slow in its realisation. In other cases, partial problems may really get processed
for incremental solutions, while other problem parts will only get symbolic
treatment (Hoppe, 1989). In the worst-case scenario, efforts at accommodation
end in failure and non-decision, like in Dutch controversies over flooding and
dike improvement, and over chlorine and sustainability in waste packaging (Van
Eeten, 1999).
Because of the relative unfamiliarity of this type of policy making, let us take
a closer look at the politics of accommodation in a restricted policy network,
designed for coping with moderately structured problems with intransigent
value conflicts and (sometimes manipulated) consensus on means. It is clear that,
as a Dutch policy scholar, I am familiar with this policy-making style. For me,
it is historically rooted in the Dutch political experience of forging peaceful
co-existence in a ‘pillarised’ society. Members of the (four) pillars had their own
religious beliefs or worldviews, and only managed to peacefully live together on
a relatively small territory through separation of ordinary people in ‘pillarised’
organisations and day-to-day activities, and compromise among their political
elites on unavoidable issues (Lijphart, 1967; Ravetz, 2001). Contemporary Dutch
abortion and euthanasia policy, to name but a few well-known examples, are still
based on the principle of accommodation politics and procedural solutions for
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Problem types and types of policy politics
individual cases.Yet, it would be wrong to conclude that this policy-making style
is typically ‘Dutch’.
In Chapter Four, the US gun control controversy was discussed as an issue
condemned to the quagmire of unstructured policy problems by the fatalist
attitude of policy makers at the federal level. Kahan and Braman (2003a, 2003b)
have analysed how cultural orientations and political preferences dominate the
US gun controversy to such an extent that evidence or knowledge appears to
play no role at all. Rather, opponents and proponents of gun control effortlessly
use identical information, or different aspects of the same pool of information,
to bolster their preferred policy position. For example, in the April 2007 Virginia
Tech massacre, proponents of gun control constructed the sad events as one more
case that proves that ordinary citizens should not have weapons at all; opponents
argued that, had fellow students not been barred by university regulations to carry
guns, the death toll would have been far less.
In such controversies, Kahan and Braman (2003) argue, you need a breakthrough
politics model to start moving again. It is a political strategy that comprises three
more or less simultaneous processes.The first is devising a type of policy discourse
or idiom they call ‘expressive overdetermination’. Such a policy discourse ought
to be sufficiently rich in social and political meanings that individuals of opposing
views on a policy issue can see their convictions and behaviour as reflected in it.
Only if policy discourse affirms the good sense and legitimacy of their original
positions, will they open up to whatever ‘objective’ information and ‘neutral’
knowledge is available. A second step is what they call ‘identity vouching’. Public
figures, politicians or scientists associated with the diverging positions should step
forward as advocates or protagonists of the new discourse, and derived policy
proposals.A final process is called ‘discourse sequencing’.The new policy discourse,
popularised and disseminated by identity vouchers, creates a new standard for
intelligent public discourse on enlightened public action.Those who stubbornly
rejected parts of the information and knowledge on stalemated, unstructured
issues due to alleged bias or strategic manipulation of its source, start to accept
and use it as a basis for their own thinking and political action.
Kahan and Braman’s analysis is perhaps too optimistic in the expectation that
identity vouching triggers true policy learning on both sides of a controversial
issue. But what they describe as a policy discourse of ‘expressive overdetermination’
is exactly what is meant in pushing an unstructured policy problem in the direction
of a structured problem by transformation in a moderately structured problem
(means). People may remain ambiguous in their policy preferences, but they open
up again to information and knowledge. This might become a sound basis for
finding more common ground for shared policy measures or instruments that
serve a double, ambiguous purpose.
It remains telling that Kahan’s and Braman’s analysis is considered sufficiently
innovative to be published in prestigious US law journals, while its political
practice belongs to the tradition of Dutch politics. Perhaps two-party political
regimes are less likely to develop and use a politics-of-accommodation style of
141
The governance of problems
policy making to deal with highly controversial and explosive political issues.
Why take this tortuous political route when both parties may hope to push
through their policy ideas simply by winning the next election? It suggests the
hypothesis that not all political regimes or systems are equally likely or able to use
all of the four policy styles identified in this chapter: rule, negotiation and search,
accommodation, and learning.This hypothesis will be discussed later in this book.
In summary, in situations of prolonged deadlock and controversy, politicians
and other policy makers sometimes resort to a politics of transformative discourse
coalition construction, conflict management, and accommodation and pacification
of conflicting values.This requires restricted, designed policy networks in which
skillful mediation and value or concept clarification assists in generating learning
processes.
Summary
The upshot of the argument so far is that, using network theory, four types of
policy politics can be specified that tend to generate the four types of policy
problems, and vice versa, in a kind of self-reinforcing process (see Figure 5.4).
Figure 5.4: Problem structure typology and types of policy politics
Far from
certainty on
required and
available
knowledge
Close to
certainty ...
UP
MSP(g)
Agenda-changing populist politics,
agonistic participation, crisis
management; deliberation and
learning in emergent network(s)
Normal advocacy coalition
politics and/or problem-driven
search in policy subsystems
MSP(m)
SP
Transformative discourse
coalition politics, accommodation
strategies or conflict
management in issue network(s)
Normal regulatory policy in
professional/technical community
Far from
agreement ...
Close to agreement on
norms and values at stake
The closer the policy network under scrutiny resembles the properties listed above
for the four types, the more likely one is to find a particular problem structure
at the heart of the dominant groups’ policy belief system. Stylised into a set of
ideal types, we have: rule for professional communities and structured problems,
negotiation and search for advocacy coalitions and moderately structured problems
(goal consensus), accommodation for contrived networks and moderately structured
problems (means consensus) and leadership or learning in open issue networks and
unstructured problems.
142
Problem types and types of policy politics
To demonstrate the plausibility or empirical adequacy of the types of policy
politics in different kinds of policy networks, and to put some flesh on the bones
of the typology, each of the types will be illustrated by one or more examples in
Chapter Six. On top of that, the opportunity will be seized to illuminate how, in
the real world, the types coexist, overlap and (co-)evolve, giving politicians and
policy makers opportunities for combinations and shifts in efforts to move away
from unstructured problems, or to break up entrenched policy communities and
structured problems.
Notes
For policy studies, see Fischer (1980), Diesing (1982) and Bobrow and Dryzek (1987).
For a more general argument on ‘epistemic drift’ in science, see Elzinga (1985).
1
Heresthetics means to set up the situation in such a way that other people will want
to join – or feel forced by circumstances to join – even without any persuasion at all;
structuring the world so you can win (Riker, 1986).
2
There are differences too. The dimension ‘degree of certainty on relevant and available
knowledge’ as used in Chapter Two is broader than ‘degree of certainty of means to
achieve ends’ as used by Thompson and Tuden.
3
That Thompson and Tuden believe that one can/should bargain about seriously
conflicting goals betrays their tacit assumption of a commercial, not a political organisation
or environment.
4
In Chapter Four, the US gun controversy was described as a typical case of an unstructured
policy problem. After the April 2007 Virginia Tech massacre, in which a depressed
and suicidal killer took the lives of 32 fellow students, New York City mayor Michael
Bloomberg immediately stepped in to mobilise more support for the city mayors’ law-andorder agenda in the gun debate (Newsweek, 30 April 2007: 33):‘The fact is, there’s common
ground on this issue for anyone who is willing to look at it honestly, not ideologically.
This isn’t about gun control. It’s about crime control.The question is, can’t we protect the
rights of law-abiding gun owners while also doing more to keep guns out of the hands of
criminals?…. One of our allies is the American Hunters and Shooters Association.… In
12 months, more than 200 mayors have signed on – and we’re still growing. Our message
is … [i]t’s about law enforcement. It’s about getting data on guns used in crimes, one of
the top tools our police have for cracking down on illegal weapons.’
5
Dramatic shooting incidents in schools, and more occasionally highly visible murders of
public figures, have caused numerous calls for action by local, state and federal government;
they have led to legislative hearings and many public statements by leaders on both sides of
the gun control issue; but net policy change from these policy dynamics has been marginal,
at best (Spitzer, 1995: 14).The 60-year long struggle for an Equal Rights Amendment to
6
143
The governance of problems
the US Constitution by feminist groups ended, three states short of ratification, in nondecision in 1982 (Mansbridge, 1986).
Hayes (2001: 129, figure 7-2) places the ‘calculated risk’ type of policy in the cell of
‘pure problems of knowledge base’. Given my views on the inescapable intertwinement
of cogitation and interaction in policy making, ‘pure problems of knowledge base’ do not
exist in politics; certainly not in the Lindblomian world that Hayes also believes to be
the most realistic one. In my typology of task environments facing policy networks, ‘pure
problems of knowledge base’ correspond to moderately structured problems (goals); with
normal incrementalism and problem-driven search as the most likely type of policy-making
process. In view of the rest of Hayes’ argument, it is a bit odd that in figure 7-2 normal
incrementalism is saved for unstructured problems, where, by his own case examples, it
is actually only one of several possible outcomes.
7
In the late 1990s, a new bureau for economic research and advice, Nyfer, tried to get
standing at the policy table of the Dutch socio-economic policy subsystem. To achieve
this, it had to compete with the quasi-autonomous, but government-sponsored, Center for
Economic Policy Analysis, which had a longstanding monopoly of expert advice in this
field. Nyfer lost the battle because most institutionalised players felt that its contributions
were tainted with too much ‘advocacy’ for preformed political positions.
8
I use the term ‘discourse coalition’ in a much more restricted way than Hajer (1995),
who characterises all policy making as discourse structuration and formation.
9
144
SIX
Problem-structuring dynamics
and meta-governance
To be a man, then, is to be one who inhabits institutions in such a
way that he preserves them even while transforming through his own
initiative. (Dauenhauer, 1986: 135)
Introduction
This chapter explores a theory of problem-structuring dynamics. It follows the
structuration logic proposed by Giddens (1979), showing how policy actors can
influence the nature of institutionalised systems of interaction while at the same
time being constrained by them. On the one hand, problem-frame shifts and
the possibilities for policy change depend on the structure of policy networks. A
closed, institutionalised policy network differs from an open, emergent or decaying
network. Part of the difference is in shaping different types of policy-making
processes, with different capacities for problem processing, and, therefore, speed,
scope and direction of policy change and innovation. On the other hand, problemframe shifts and policy change depend on the actions of players in the network.
The policy players are constrained, but also exploit the opportunities offered by
the network structures. Some policy players may come to see an existing policy
network as insufficiently geared to the emergent new problem framing and the
solutions it is generating. Hence, they may engage in interventions that gently
nudge a policy network to change from one type to another, with concomitant
changes in opportunities and possibilities for policy change.This reflects a sort of
policy entrepreneurship, occasionally amounting to institutional and intellectual
entrepreneurship, which may be called the meta-governance of problems. It operates
on a higher level than ‘ordinary’ policy entrepreneurship.
This chapter serves a triple purpose. First, the types of policy politics introduced
in the previous chapter are clarified and illustrated through four case examples.
Second, it is shown how types of policy politics shift through time. Policy problemnetwork configurations are not static, but dynamic. Third, in the concluding
section, attention is focused on this co-evolution of problem reframing and the
shifts between types of policy politics. Transitions from one type to the next,
whatever the other possible factors involved, apparently cannot be explained
unless taking into account the meta-governance interventions of some policycum-institutional entrepreneurs.
145
The governance of problems
Structuring the policy problem: prenatal screening in the
Netherlands (1990-2007)1
Medical-technological possibilities for genetic screening and early warning for
lethal diseases or diseases with severe negative impacts on quality of life have
increased considerably. In 2007, the Dutch government put into force a screening
programme for all pregnant women, which enables (but not forces) them to know
whether they are carrying a foetus with an increased probability for Down’s
syndrome or neural tube defects (potentially leading to spina bifida or anencephaly).
Deep-rooted ethical ambivalences and technological uncertainties around prenatal
screening generated an unstructured, seemingly ‘wicked’ problem. It took 20 years
of political and policy debate for it to be successfully structured or ‘domesticated’.
Prenatal screening as an unstructured problem: non-decision making in an
open issue network (1990s)
In the late 1970s, the Health Department introduced the opportunity of free
(that is, reimbursed through public health insurance) voluntary prenatal testing
to the limited category of women aged 36 years and over. But as late as 1989,
the then deputy minister resisted pilot research into the possibilities for offering
prenatal screening to all pregnant women irrespective of age. In making this nondecision, he rejected Health Council advice to seriously study the possibilities for
population testing; in fact, he elevated a dissenting minority position to majority
political judgement in the Cabinet and Parliament.
This political judgement rested on a web of ethical and technical arguments.
Technically, prenatal testing technology showed many false positives and false
negatives; and there were a considerable number of iatrogenic miscarriages. On the
ethical side, one feared that these technical imperfections meant a disproportionate
psychosocial burden on the women to be tested. Organisationally, the decentralised
infrastructure of obstetric care made uniform medical standards and quality
control almost infeasible. Furthermore, and more importantly, there being no
further medical treatments for foetuses with neural tube defects, one doubted the
relevance of testing as long as parents-to-be actually did not have options other
than abortion.To consider abortion an ethically acceptable option to be facilitated
by government became one of the major political battle lines in the policy debate.
For children born with Down’s syndrome, one feared stigmatisation of families
as imposing an ‘elected’ physical-mental disability on the child. Generally, it was
felt that prenatal screening for the entire population of pregnant women was
‘medicalising’ normal physical events like pregnancy and motherhood.
Overall, the Dutch government, especially the Christian-Democratic part
of the Cabinet, considered the issue of further expanding prenatal testing an
unstructured problem, not yet fit for authoritative decisions. All it had to do to
justify its non-decisions was to assemble the doubts and objections raised by the
players who happened to take part in the social and public debate on the issue
146
Problem-structuring dynamics and meta-governance
(see Figure 6.1). As it could not stop medical-technological, organisational and
communicative advances in certain academic medical research centres in the
practice of testing women aged 36 and over, the government erected another
barrier. In 1991, it ruled that if in the future prenatal screening was to be offered
to all women, as of 1996 screening centres would need official permits under the
Law on Medical Population Screening (Wet Bevolkingsonderzoek).This law formally
intended to guarantee good quality of the testing methods and organisation of
screening programmes.
In practice, the announced law had two impacts. First, it led to hot debates
on whether or not pregnancy was an indication for necessary medical care; and
whether or not informing pregnant women about prenatal screening was subject
to a licence requirement, or just the actual testing itself. Second, the law was a
spur to improve the sensitivity and specificity of tests in prenatal screening. It
put a premium on intensified research for technological advance. Yet, due to
successful political tactics of debate avoidance, it was not until 1998 that the Health
Department formally requested new advice by the Health Council on this issue.
Both the distribution of substantive issue positions and the policy actor
constellation show this period until 2000 to have the properties of an open issue
network. Multiple actors, mainly professional associations, interest groups and some
individual ethicists, participated in the debate; the positions diverged strongly;
and although some alliances between players were visible, it was hard to discern
any dominant voices in the debate.
Figure 6.1:The open issue network, until 2000
Screening irrespective of age unacceptable; no
medicalisation of pregnancy
Insufficient
knowledge about
psychosocial
consequences
Researchers in
academic medical
centres
Screening
irrespective
of age
Health Department
Dissenting voice in
Health Council
Medical associations
for obstetrics,
gynaecology
and clinical
genetics
Ethical
commission on
medical research,
parents with
disabled children,
some ethicists
Insufficient knowledge
about quality control
and organisation
Individual,
informed choice
Health
Council
Pilot study
Source: Adapted and translated from Meijer (2008: 34)
147
The governance of problems
Problem structuring in a designed network (2001-03)
Responding to the minister’s 1998 request, in May 2001 the Health Council
published its new advisory report. Acknowledging considerable technological
advance in screening technology, the Council stated that:
[U]nder provision that all preconditions can be met, probabilistic
screening for Down syndrome and neural tube defects is so superior
an alternative to the existing opportunities for women older than
36, that offering prenatal screening to all pregnant women should no
longer be delayed. Screening does offer actionable options (including abortion)
to parents-to-be. (emphasis added)
This advice, of course, caused a lot of upheaval and intense public and political
debate by many participants. In October 2001, the Health Department organised
a large-scale consultative meeting. The list of participants included two women
interest groups, six parental and patient associations, seven medical-professional
associations, two researchers and a representative of the major national research
institute for public health (RIVM), two other advisory institutes and five
government agencies. The department clearly structured the debate by focusing
on the ethical and practical preconditions for the introduction of population
screening:
• good counselling and psychosocial coaching for women and couples in order
to guarantee free, autonomous and informed choice;
• development of new, improved documentation and information materials for
women and couples;
• guaranteed societal acceptance and good care for all people who have physical
and/or mental disabilities;
• centralised implementation and organisation of new procedures;
• putting in place a sound system for evaluation and monitoring of screening
practices; and
• putting in place facilities for preparatory and retraining for future implementers.
During the consultative meeting and in ensuing debates, the participants were
clearly split into two camps (see Figure 6.2): a larger one in favour of, the other
against the introduction of, expanded screening opportunities.
Interestingly, both professional and parental and patient associations were to
be found on both sides of the issue. More importantly, positions on the ethical
issues clearly converged. Protagonists and antagonists mainly differed in their
judgements of the practical constraints. With the benefit of hindsight, one
may conclude that the Health Department transformed the policy problem in
organising and structuring debate during the consultative meeting. It is apparent
that the department aimed for discourse coalition building. It desired to strongly
148
Problem-structuring dynamics and meta-governance
Figure 6.2:The government-designed consultative network, 2001-03
Health Department:
no expanded
screening
Protagonists
a.o. Health Council, RIVM,
Healthcare Insurance
Board, associations
of medical specialists
(obstetrics, geneticists,
gynaecologists), parent
and patient association
(VSOP)
Introduce expanded screening
under ethical and practical
preconditions
Shortages
of well-qualified
personnel
Antagonists
Practical
bottlenecks
a.o. Royal Medical Society
(KNMG), Federation of
Parental Associations
(FVO), some individual
gynaecologists and ethicists
Medicalisation of
pregnancy inevitable
Counselling for
younger women
impossible
Source: Adapted and translated from Meijer (2008: 34)
link the introduction of expanded screening possibilities to agreement on a series
of constraints, as a precondition for its approval of the new policy. It pushed for
ethical convergence in a convenient yet representative issue network of invited,
knowledgeable stakeholders. This indicates strong conflict management in a
designed policy network.Yet, although the Health Department’s policy network
management was successful, macro-political developments caused the fall of two
Cabinets and prolonged the period of non-decisions by two more years.
Implementing prenatal screening in a closed professional community
(2003-present)
In 2003, the deputy minister of health announced the introduction of the
programme for expanded screening.Yet, he did not completely follow the issue
network’s apparent majority. Henceforth, all women aged under 36 would be
informed about the possibilities for prenatal screening, but, contrary to those
aged 36 and over, still had to pay out of their own pocket for the screening and
subsequent diagnostic procedures. This decision set in motion the final stage
of problem structuring: composing and putting to work a closed professional
implementation network around the by now fully structured problem (see Figure
6.3). Since 2006, this closed professional network is hierarchically coordinated
and managed by the RIVM’s Centre for Population Research.
149
The governance of problems
Figure 6.3: Contemporary closed professional network
RIVM’s Centre for
Population Research
Central body for prenatal screening
– Coordinating commission
– Platform for regional centres
Counsellors may
be GPs, gynaecologists,
obstetricians,
also genetic
consultants,
clinical geneticists
in clinical centres
Health Council
permits
Seven working groups,
among which information
and communication
Eight regional centres
Counsellors
Health insurance
companies
reimbursements
Echoscopist
Laboratories
Source: Adapted and translated from Meijer (2008, appendix IV)
Up until now, monitoring and evaluation of the operation of the screening
programme have shown satisfactory results – except for the counselling of
younger women. Evaluations in 2003 and 2006 indicate that many women
cannot adequately process the information on which they have to decide to have
a test. Much the same applies to the communication with medical professionals
in interpreting test results. Consequently, as much as one third of all women
cannot be said to make autonomous, well-informed choices. Yet, excellent
counselling in order to guarantee free, autonomous and well-informed patient
choice was the single most important ethical precondition for implementing the
expanded screening programme.Well-designed user-focused evaluation research
and subsequent redesign of information materials and counselling practices may
still remedy this problem. Yet, with the absence of tangible improvements on
this score, the structured character of the prenatal screening issue may well be
challenged in the future.
Breakdown of a structured problem: soil pollution in the
Volgermeer Polder (1980-81)2
Citizens get an unpleasant surprise
In the early 1980s, people living in the surroundings of a rubbish dump in the
Volgermeer Polder clashed with the city government of the nearby Dutch capital,
150
Problem-structuring dynamics and meta-governance
Amsterdam. The city government, facing a lack of sites to dump and process its
city waste, badly needed the Volgermeer dump. In the spring of 1980, barrels with
toxic substances were discovered there. A dragline driver mentioned his alarming
find to an employee of the city government’s Central Environmental Laboratory.
By the end of April, the city government publicly mentioned the discovery of the
toxic barrels in a press release. In May, a working group of expert civil servants
was appointed to formally coordinate city government policy. Next to people
from the Environmental Laboratory, colleagues from the city government Public
Health Department were members of this expert group. Samples from the dump’s
mud and water were drawn and sent to the (at the time) National Institute for
Public Health (RIV).
Inhabitants of the village adjacent to the dump – Broek-in-Waterland – were
informed about the existence of a serious environmental problem by the press,
not by the government.They became alarmed when one of them speculated that
among the toxic substances there might be the highly toxic dioxin. Dioxin had
been released in a 1963 explosion of the Philips Duphar production site at the
North Sea Channel (close to the Amsterdam harbour area). The explosion had
contaminated the entire building to such an extent that it had to be torn down
and dumped in the ocean. Until that time, Philips Duphar was one of the users of
the Volgermeer dump. Although city government officials denied the speculative
assertion, anxiety among the inhabitants mounted. In August 1980, they founded
the Citizen Committee Rubbish Dump Broek. The committee demanded full
disclosure of research reports, participation in the city government’s coordination
working group, instant closure of the dump in order to prevent further leakage
of toxic substances in the environment, and serious attention to medical and
psychological consequences of the pollution. In agenda-building terms, the citizens
of Broek-in-Waterland mobilised to transform needs and demands into an issue
on the city government’s political agenda.
The municipal government, decides, announces and … loses
In the beginning, the city government responded negatively. Its strategy was
based on the following vital policy-diagnostic assumptions. Pollution at the
Volgermeer dumping site is a waste-dump capacity problem for Amsterdam and
other surrounding local governments.The policy’s major goal is safeguarding this
public interest. People living in the dump’s surroundings typically exhibit Not-InMy-Back-Yard behaviour, informed by pure self-interested needs and worries. In
a political and administrative weighing of a public versus a private group interest,
the public interest naturally prevails. The policy instrument to achieve the goal
is, first, a problem survey, and second, a solution for the pollution problem. This
is technically complex, so research and risk assessment ought to be delegated to
technical experts with the right (toxicological, medical and legal) expertise to
interpret research results and to translate them into policy measures. Therefore,
citizen influence is undesirable, let alone participation in the coordination
151
The governance of problems
committee. Citizens lack expertise; they have panicked and, therefore, they are
unable to appreciate well-reasoned judgements or have an unbiased eye for
the public interest. Of course, inhabitants should be well informed by prudent
communication policy.The communication policy’s goal is to counteract anxiety;
and the principal means is caution in releasing new information, which might
nourish existing anxiety and worries. In summary, on these assumptions, the city
government considered the policy problem structured, its solution a technical fix,
and its overall political and administrative strategy one of rule.‘Decide-announcedefend’ is a good characterisation.
This strategy started to crumble in the autumn of 1980, mainly because of
blunders in the communication of research findings, subsequently exposed and
skilfully exploited by the Citizen Committee. Late October 1980, the Central
Environmental Laboratory’s director, in a city council meeting, had to concede
that small, but in his expert view not risky, amounts of dioxin had indeed been
found in the barrels, as well as in the mud samples. In the same meeting, the
Alderman for Environmental Affairs announced that the Citizen Committee
would no longer be excluded from the policy-making process; henceforth it was
invited to official meetings of the coordinating working group. During NovemberDecember 1980, the front-office semblance of governmental unity broke down
irrevocably. There came different policy statements by councillors, and even by
high-level officials in several city government departments. The Province of
North Holland’s Inspectorate for Environmental Hygiene publicly supported the
Citizen Committee’s demand for closure of the dump at short notice. Facing so
much criticism from many sides, the Alderman for Public Works felt compelled to
publicly defend the definition of the problem as a waste-dump capacity problem.
New players, and two advocacy coalitions
Paradoxically, the alderman’s defence of the old, structured-problem definition
disclosed that the taken-for-granted political strategy of the closed Amsterdam
policy community was breaking down. The policy network expanded from city
government experts and aldermen to include, next to the Citizen Committee, the
other local governments involved in the issue; the office of the dike-reeve with
high stakes in the issue; the Environmental Inspectorate of the Province of North
Holland; and even the national Department for Public Health and Environmental
Hygiene. Formally, the Provinciale Waterstaat (PWS), or North Holland division of
the national Directorate General for Public Works and Water Management, became
the new authority for policy formulation. The city government’s coordinating
working group, henceforth called the Working Group Volgermeer, became a
subgroup of the PWS’s working group on soil clean-up policy.
This new policy network was split into at least two advocacy coalitions. One
advocacy coalition around the Amsterdam city government kept denying a causal
connection between the pollution and still unproven health risks; and therefore
advocated to keep the dump open as long as possible to meet capacity problems.
152
Problem-structuring dynamics and meta-governance
The challengers, led by the provincial Inspectorate for Environmental Hygiene
and, of course, the Citizen Committee, considered a plausible causal connection
between pollution and environmental damage more than sufficient reason to
close down the dump and start a clean-up operation as soon as possible. When
the representative of the national government expressed willingness to pay up
to 90% of the clean-up costs, the policy network converged on the new goal of
cleaning up the pollution. But the scope and thoroughness of the clean-up, largely
depending on a more precise assessment of environmental and health risks of the
amount of pollution, was to remain a bone of contention between the advocacy
coalitions for quite some time. Insisting on research by experts, and respect for the
findings among the non-scientists or non-experts in the network, the new policy
subsystem acquired its definitive shape. In the end, the Citizen Committee had to
accept the experts’ considered judgement that no additional health risks existed.
Negotiating a solution in an expanded, but controlled policy network
Starting from December 1980, a new approach emerged that substituted
governmental and technocratic guardianship for more political pluralism. The
policy-making process opened up to public scrutiny; the small, closed policy
community gradually gave way to a much more expanded policy network;
actor-members of the network recognised that they had different interests, and
were allowed to design and formulate their own policy positions, and could enter
into negotiations with each other to form partnerships or alliances. Of course,
all policy actors were committed to some form of majority rule. But in order
to influence majority building, policy actors were allowed to use information
strategically, in the sense of using the same, public information in bolstering one’s
own policy position. In doing so, however, one had to respect the legitimacy and
expertise of other network members. After a while, the new policy network was
institutionalised under the formal authority of provincial, and indirectly even
national, government.
In this case it is interesting to observe how subtle intervention by national
government, the Department for Public Health and Environmental Hygiene, in
fact opened up the space for a new moderately structured problem with some
goal consensus (soil clean-up) through making available financial resources.Yet,
simultaneously, national intervention constrained the bargaining space for the other
policy actors by making the scope (and thus, total costs) of the clean-up operation
dependent on further risk assessment by experts. Next to making negotiation
possible, problem-driven, scientific research was part of the constitution of the
new policy network as a well-delineated subsystem. Higher-level government
intervention thus both enabled and constrained the creation of the new policy
subsystem. In this new policy subsystem, advocacy coalitions could work out a
compromise on the means to solve a new, moderately structured problem. They
could compete and negotiate but had to respect and use the results of problemdriven expert search.
153
The governance of problems
From rule to learning, on to bargaining … and back? Drug
policy in Swiss cities (1980s-90s)3
Repression by a closed professional community
Like in so many other countries, in Switzerland the AIDS/HIV explosion of the
mid-1980s had a far-reaching impact on policies towards drugs and drug users.
Table 6.1 provides an overview of policy change before and after the 1980s. Policy
network dynamics is the result of cognitive and political interaction between
three advocacy coalitions.
Table 6.1: Advocacy coalitions and their belief systems in Swiss drug policy,
1980-2000
Prohibition and
abstinence coalition
(hegemonic until around
1985)
Harm reduction
coalition (dominant but
disputed since late 1980s;
forced into alliance with
quality of life advocates in
1990s)
Neighbourhood
quality of life
coalition (somewhat
successful coalition with
abstinentists; since 1990s
successful alliance with
harm reductionists)
Policy
subsystem
membership
Policy community of
public prosecutors, judges,
police; most medical
sector professionals;
later, some right-wing,
conservative politicians
Advocacy coalition
of converted health
professionals, social and
youth workers, churches
and charitable institutions,
left-wing politicians and
journalists
Advocacy coalition
of shopkeepers’ and
parents’ associations,
neighbourhood
associations, planning
groups, ad hoc
committees, landlords,
real estate developers
Deep core
Citizens owe deep
respect to dominant
socio-cultural norms;
repression is a legitimate
instrument of state
authority to correct
‘deviants’ – hierarchical
bias
Individuals’ integrity
and autonomy more
important than social
order; individuals should
be helped, but free
to reject assistance –
individualist, liberal bias
Social, cultural and
economic prosperity for
cities and neighbourhoods;
minimise disturbances for
normal urban policies; mix
of egalitarian-communitarian and individualist
biases
Policy core
Treatment should be
Abstinence from
psychoactive drugs; forced a drug addict’s free
choice; harm reduction
therapy
facilities (especially needle
exchange programmes)
allow both individual
physical integrity and
avoidance of social harm
Public order and security;
expressed as demand
for ‘Stadtverträglichkeit’
(compatibility with
normal city life) of harm
reduction measures for
drug addicts
Instrumental
beliefs
Primary prevention;
policy repression against
drug users and dealers;
offer efficient therapy;
elimination of services
that make drug users feel
comfortable
Loosening policy
protection; ‘open scenes’
for effective outreach
for and access to harm
reduction facilities;
pioneer projects;
managing harm reduction
facilities in conformance
with ‘Stadtverträglichkeit’
Experts in most
instruments for urban
policy; actively monitoring
the management of harm
reduction facilities
Source: Kübler (2001)
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Problem-structuring dynamics and meta-governance
Prohibitionists or abstentionists represent the control-and-contain strategy
(described in Chapter Three), typical for a hierarchical way of dealing with
structured problems (in the cultural-theory terms of Chapter Four). It was the
hegemonic, mono-paradigmatic belief system of relevant policy makers for most of
the 20th century. Looking at the actor configuration it is clear that policy-making
responsibility was in fact handed over to a closed policy community of medical and
law-and-order experts. During the 1980s, the prohibitionist policy of repression,
penalisation and (some) therapy started to have visible counterproductive effects.
Drug users found themselves in poor health and difficult social conditions
partly because of the stigmatising effects of a penalising approach. Where local
concentrations of drug users occurred, needle sharing posed excessive risks of
exposure to HIV-contaminated blood. Drug prostitution was an important link
in the potential transmission of the disease to the population at large. Especially
health professionals who worked in fields such as infectious diseases and public
health warned about the social risks implied by the repressive policy.
These medical professional circles were the breeding ground for an alternative,
harm reduction policy belief system; described in Chapter Three as voluntaristconsensual, and individualist in cultural orientation (Chapter Four). From about
1985, the public health professionals effectively challenged the hegemonic belief
system and policy practice by criticising its counterproductive side effects. On the
level of values and goals, law and order should be weighed against both individual
freedom of drug users, and the social risk posed to the larger population by drug
use. Instead of one overarching goal, there were three goals to consider. On the
level of policy instruments, the official prohibition to distribute clean needles and
syringes to drug users was criticised in particular. Health professionals were joined
in their criticism by street and youth workers, who started illegal experiments
such as ‘stress-free zones’, where drug users were safe against police repression and
had easy access to harm reduction facilities and other forms of social assistance.
This counter-coalition between a ‘hard’ and a ‘soft’ profession was ambivalent
about policy preferences, but convinced that repression was no longer priority
number one. It had many uncertainties about the best way to deal with AIDS/
HIV, but the certainty that drug use was a dangerous disseminator of the disease.
Therefore, it urged the federal government to initiate an innovative, experimental
policy approach.
Thus, the political predicament became a highly unstructured policy problem.
In the words of a former network manager: ‘And they [the private organisations
and associations, RH] finally understood that I (incarnating the state), given the
complexity of the problem, had no idea as to who was right and who was wrong,
and that indeed I would be a fool to choose’ (Wälti and Kübler, 2003: 505).
Opening up to policy change
Fortunately, key federal policy makers and top-level bureaucrats realised that
learning about a new approach was inevitable. They took the calculated risk
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The governance of problems
to open up the policy-making process to new participants and trial-and-error
learning. However, they had to act against a mounting stream of political opinion
that ‘less government’ was called for, and that the then current economic recession
did not economically allow new government tasks to be taken on. Nevertheless,
they managed to free sufficient financial and other resources to help the harm
reduction coalition to promote their policies of creating more, and more accessible
harm reduction facilities.
They did so through a two-pronged strategy. On the one hand, they supported
scientific research and evaluation on harm reduction measures through funding
by the Federal Office for Public Health. On the other hand, through start-up
subsidies they tempted local and cantonal governments, traditionally responsible
for public health and the provision of help to drug users, into local experiments
and pioneer projects. At the urban and local levels, this led to a significant
diversification of the network of actors dealing with the problem. In all major
Swiss cities, commissions or forums were formed with consultative functions.They
were composed of representatives of both the public and the private sector; yet
formally designated by government.These commissions and forums were linked
up to special, new inter-agency coordination structures.They were complemented
by other organisational mechanisms for involving neighbourhood and citizen
groups in the learning-for-policy-making process.
In realising the harm reduction facilities policy, social, street-corner and youth
workers succumbed to the predictable organisational efficiency-compulsion to
make the facilities as large, user-friendly and accessible as possible. This meant
that they were located as close as possible to the ‘stress-free zones’ or ‘open drugs
scenes’, where the concentration of drugs users made it easier to reach as many
clients as possible. By maximising target group reach and organisational feasibility,
the harm reduction policy actors burdened many citizens with many social
nuisances. Open drugs scenes just are not very compatible with nearby schools
or shopping malls.
Among others, shopkeepers’ and parental associations rather quickly formed
a third advocacy coalition that comprised all sorts of people interested in
neighbourhood quality of life. In terms of the cultural orientations in Chapter
Four, the policy belief system of the neighbourhood quality of life coalition was
communitarianism in a capitalist economic environment: a blend of egalitarian and
individualist assumptions and preferences. In the beginning, the harm reduction
people just accused the neighbourhood quality advocates of short-sighted and selfinterested NIMBY-behaviour. Nevertheless, when local coalitions of convenience
between abstentionists and neighbourhood security advocates proved successful
in stopping local harm reduction facility building, harm reductionists sought a
coalition with the neighbourhood security people. Since the latter were not really
opposed to the principle of harm reduction, but mainly worried about negative
side effects on their localities, across-coalition learning on the instrumental level of
policy beliefs and practices turned out to be possible. Members from both advocacy
coalitions gradually worked out the principles and practices of ‘Stadtverträglichkeit’
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Problem-structuring dynamics and meta-governance
or ‘urban compatibility’: a new local-evel balance between public order and public
health policies on drug use. The harm reduction facilities were moved out of
public sight and out of the vicinity of other indisputably public institutions for
ordinary citizens. In addition, neighbourhood security people actively participated
in monitoring the management of harm reduction facilities.
Return to a new ‘subgovernment’?
This turned out to be a sustainable compromise. It was largely made possible, first,
by the institutional crosswalk created by the ‘new governance’ and broader scope
of ‘associative pluralism’ in the new drug policy network and implementation
structure. Yet, second, the learning process was strongly facilitated by city
government officials acting as network managers, who succeeded in setting up
the forums in such a way that ‘the right people talked to each other about the
right issues’ (Wälti and Kübler, 2003: 516).
However, the longer the ‘new governance’ type of policy network exists, the
more learning tends to be substituted for negotiation among a smaller number
of selected proximate policy makers. Learning and deliberation in emergent new
issue networks with many new proximate policy makers appears to be a transition
stage between rule by a policy community of experts, and negotiation between
policy makers belonging to a new advocacy coalition. It may even evolve into
another ‘iron triangle’ around a newly shaped hegemonic policy belief system.
Wälti and Kübler (2003: 521) conclude their empirical analysis of Swiss drug
policy by observing the development of a new type of ‘subgovernment’:
The network of actors, which emerged in the beginning of the 1990s
as a result of deliberate efforts to diversify the approach to drug related
problems in the urban context, has subsequently been subjected to
a concentration and centralisation around a number of privileged
private partners dealing with state agencies.... [T]he joint aim of new
governance structures to foster both coordination and competition
leads to a certain ‘cartel’-building among associations.… [T]he state’s
attempt to govern pluralistic networks seems to foster the emergence
of new corporatist arrangements…. [T]his concentration is not only
structural but also of ‘ideational’ nature, in that associations tend to
be selectively excluded if they do not comply with the dominant
policy paradigm.
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The governance of problems
From unstructured problem to accommodation: protecting
the Wadden Sea area’s ecological values (1965-80)4
Deconstructing a structured water management problem
The Wadden Sea is a shallow strip of sea extending along the northern Dutch
North Sea coast and several small islands. Diking and land reclamation is part of
the Dutch identity. Since the Middle Ages, dikes were built and land reclaimed
also in the Wadden Sea landscape. Until the Second White Paper on Spatial
Planning,5 approved by both chambers of Dutch Parliament in 1966, diking and
reclamation of the entire Wadden Sea area was an indubitable, official policy goal.
Next to a century-long logic of flood prevention and water management, longterm demographic and (regional) economic prognoses justified reclamation of
large stretches of the Wadden Sea area. Based on a confluence of safety issues and
demands for more space in a taken-for-granted definition of the public interest,
this policy logic was to be undermined in the 1970s and 1980s.
In a first stage, roughly from 1965 until 1974, the nature of the issue of the
Wadden Sea area shifted from a self-evident problem of water management and
economic development, to a problem of preservation of environmental and
ecological values. The unstructuring of the traditional problem structure was
initiated in 1965, when 16-year-old Kees Wevers took the initiative to establish
the Association for the Preservation of the Wadden Sea, or the Wadden Association,
for short.The established nature conservation associations, focusing on buying and
preserving small, isolated nature patches, were considered unsuitable in finding and
shaping a completely new political problem: the ecological interdependency of the
entire Wadden Sea area. Only a short while later, the Royal Academy of Sciences
established a multidisciplinary commission of independent experts, to study the
spatial planning and ecological dimensions of the Wadden Sea area. In a later stage,
civil servants from the National Spatial Planning Directorate (Rijkplanologische
Dienst; RPD), the departments of Traffic and Water Management (Verkeer en
Waterstaat; VandW) and Culture, Leisure and Social Work (Cultuur, Recreatie en
Maatschappelijk Werk; CRM) were to participate in this committee’s study. It was
the first, feeble sign that the new problem framing had attracted the attention of
those setting the political and policy agendas of the national government.
In 1968-69, it had become clear that, for the first time in Dutch political
and administrative history, the Directorate General of Water Management
(Rijkswaterstaat; RWS) no longer had a monopolistic competence in preparing land
reclamation policy. For the Wadden Sea area, RWS had to share its competency
with a broad interdepartmental commission, consisting of proponents and
opponents of new land reclamation. In 1971, the official government agreement
of the new Dutch coalition government mentioned the possibility of keeping
the Wadden Sea untouched. When the interdepartmental commission published
its policy recommendations by 1974, the result was a draw, to be interpreted as a
moral victory for the opponents.The advice was to give up any plans for wholesale
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Problem-structuring dynamics and meta-governance
or partial diking and land reclamation. However, the commission refrained from
any positive policy advice, stressing instead the inevitability of new political
choices in a pioneering compromise between advantages and disadvantages of
land reclamation and threats to ecological values.
An unstructured problem is born
What apparently happened in the interdepartmental commission was a learning
process. Unstructured problems show uncertainty about available and required
knowledge, and a re-evaluation of old and an introduction of new values at stake.
Both uncertainty and value conflict and ambiguity were unmistakable in this case.
The Royal Academy of Science’s expert committee indicated that knowledge
uncertainty was genuine. If such a prestigious scientific body shows concern, it
means that opponents of the Wadden Association, or established policy makers and
political organisations for that matter, could no longer ignore new information as
biased or disingenuous evidence. In the interdepartmental committee, it became
clear that the traditional confluence of military and economic interests with water
management was disputed in the case of the Wadden Sea area.The department of
Defence considered military purposes better served when the Wadden Sea was left
alone; the oil companies, eager to explore gas reserves, feared interference from
other economic interests in the area; and there were other regional economic
interests to be considered, such as cockle fishery, tourism and shipping.Thus, the
department of Economic Affairs could no longer unconditionally support the
RWS interests.
Of course, uncertainty about traditional values was skilfully exploited by the
proponents of new ecological value. However, most important, and contrary to
the Volgermeer case discussed above, the existence of uncertainty was openly
acknowledged by the authorities. Instead of a ‘decide-announce-defend’ strategy,
in the Wadden Sea case the authorities opted for a ‘let’s-make-new-sense-together’
strategy. Colliding and challenging visions were allowed on the policy table;
and to the extent possible there was a serious effort to integrate old and new
problem framings and visions. That explains why new information and insights
penetrated the political agenda rather swiftly and smoothly, and was not only used
strategically. That is why it is justified to typify the political and administrative
process as learning. Of course, this does not mean that opposition all of a sudden
completely vanished. It just means that ecological values had acquired standing
among authoritative policy makers. Instead of being disregarded, they had to be
taken into account as a legitimate normative and knowledge dimension in policy
discussions.
Domesticating the ‘wicked’ problem by proceduralisation
The second stage of the policy-making process, between roughly 1974 and 1980,
shows how policy makers transformed the unstructured problem of conflicting
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The governance of problems
values around the Wadden Sea area into a moderately structured problem.
Opponents and proponents of ecological values worked out compromises
around an abstract and global, but consensual goal formulation in a fixed legaladministrative procedure. This second stage may be characterised as a process of
constructing a discursive, as well as a procedural, crosswalk.
In fact, there were two parallel processes of institutional and discursive design
– one governmental, the other nongovernmental and initiated by the Wadden
Association.The latter established an expert commission of legal and administrative
scholars to design the contours of an optimal administrative structure, which
ought to ensure that ‘[the Wadden Sea area] is administered and managed in the
only right way, that is such that its ecological value does not decline, and later
generations cannot blame us for careless treatment of the relatively most unspoilt
nature area in the Netherlands’ (Commissie Staatsen, quoted in Hisschemöller
and Van Koolwijk, 1982:45). The commission opted for a special Wadden Sea
Law, because this vast area could only be protected, maintained and restored by
the state if there was indubitable, visible support by a majority in Parliament. On
top of that, the ambitious goal might only be achieved when its legal basis forced
other government bodies to take it seriously, even if they referred to other laws. In
legal appeal and redress procedures by lower governments, administrative judges
ought to be able to use it as a legally based, overriding criterion for their rulings.
Administrative and policy responsibility for policy preparation and implementation
was to be vested in one department, for Culture, Leisure and Social Work, at the
time the department accountable for nature conservation. In addition, a Wadden
Council was to be set up as a political, public forum to initiate debates on the
operationalisation of the abstract policy goal. In addition, the administrative
structure was to feature an interdepartmental commission and an inspectorate
for the Wadden Sea area.
The expert commission’s proposal was a compromise between technocratic
guardianship and normal democratic politics: ensuring a kind of ‘special status’
authority for well-integrated policy for the nature conservation goal on the
one hand; and on the other, the requirement of a lasting democratic process of
interest representation and trade-offs. In the governmental venue the trade-off
between these opposed requirements was shaped differently. The formal policy
goal was less ambitious, ‘the protection, maintenance, and where necessary
restoration of the Wadden Sea as a nature area’ (quoted in Hisschemöller and Van
Koolwijk, 1982: 47). Policy initiative and administrative discretion were vested
in the department of Housing and Spatial Planning, particularly its Directorate
General for Spatial planning (RPD). This is because, in the Netherlands, spatial
planning is a policy domain that is largely procedural, not substantive; and
oriented towards interdepartmental and intergovernmental interest mediation,
with substantive policy making and policy implementation taking place at lower
levels of government, with (partial) access for other national departments.
Furthermore, the emerging goals consensus was not to be anchored in law, but
in a special legal-administrative procedure for key decisions on spatial planning, the
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Problem-structuring dynamics and meta-governance
so-called ‘planologische kernbeslissing’ (PKB).This procedure starts with government
announcing a fairly detailed policy intention, followed by official meetings in
which organised or unorganised citizens can raise their voice (‘inspraak’), and by
required advisory procedures, the most important of which concerns the Advisory
Council on Spatial Planning (Raad van Advies voor de Ruimtelijke Ordening; RARO).
Based on citizen comments and official advice, government then formulates a
final proposal for parliamentary approval. In this case, this PKB procedure lasted
four years, from 1976 until 1980.
It is clear why the Wadden Association preferred its own design. A PKB
procedure lacks the force of law; meaning that Wadden Sea ecological values
and goals may loose out to sectoral policy intentions enshrined in law. Second,
official policy intentions not only mentioned a Wadden Sea major goal, but also
mentioned secondary goals that might conflict with the major goal.This implied
that, for example, decision making on exploratory drilling for gas reserves on the
island of Ameland, or on harbour facilities for the Eems Harbour near Delfzijl,
would not find their basis in official Wadden Sea policy, but would be subjected
to normal political struggles between the usual suspects of vested interests in local,
provincial and national policy making. In terminology introduced above when
discussing policy making in open issue networks, the Wadden Sea Association
feared dramaturgical incrementalism.6 Finally, although the PKB procedure offers
formal opportunities for citizens and non-governmental organisations like the
Wadden Association to make their voices heard, this is only after government
formulated and argued its policy proposals. In this late stage of policy preparation,
the government has an interest in sticking to its position, often an interdepartmental
compromise, at the expense of public transparency. In other words, compared to
the Wadden Association’s discursive and institutional design, the PKB procedure
was a typical, government-centred and -controlled proposal.Yet, the Association
accepted it, but only as a first step towards its own preferences.
The choice for a PKB procedure is clearly a political one, rooted in a couple of
agreed policy beliefs. The Wadden Sea area is an irreplaceable nature area under
threat; so we deal with a vulnerable interest that, without special governmental
attention, will lose out to stronger interests. This implies the setting of a major
new policy goal: protection and, if necessary, restoration of environmental and
ecological values. However, next to the major policy goal, there are other values
and goals that clearly qualify as public interest, worthy of government attention;
their disregard will most probably erode the consensus about the new major policy
goal. Hence, an integrated policy for the new major goals cannot be achieved
without global consensus among major stakeholders in society.Therefore, we need
a decision-making procedure, in this case the PKB, which in fact ties multiple
policy actors together in a global consensus on a rather abstract goal; which
means that public participation and public transparency have to be tapered down
considerably. Clinging to this procedure as if it were the policy goal itself creates
practical certainty around the means for accommodating the value conflict around
policy goals. It is a depoliticising strategy of accommodation, or pacification of
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The governance of problems
conflicting, sometimes intransigent values. It is a strategy that is conflict avoiding,
because any conflict that publicly articulates the implacable value positions, will
nurture polarisation of views and exacerbate political compromise.
Problem structuring, change in policy politics, and
meta-governance
Problem-structuring trajectories
The case examples allow two major conclusions. First, contrary perhaps to what
they suggest, the problem type–policy politics type couplings are not necessarily
stable configurations. Rather, both typologies should be considered as a kind of
conceptual canvass for visualising and demonstrating the dynamics or drift in
problem structuring in a policy domain. Clearly, problem-frame shifts do occur
(Schön and Rein, 1994). More than that, and in addition to Rein and Schön’s
original analysis, provided the frame shifts imply a shift in problem type too, they
bring shifts in policy network type or policy politics in their wake. Figure 6.4
summarises and captures the problem-structuring trends in the case examples
for the periods observed. Note that analysis registers and focuses on a historical
trajectory of changing hegemonic or dominant problem structurings in a policy
domain.
The prenatal screening case shows how the Health Department, in close
coordination with the Health Council, through non-decision making and clever
political manoeuvring, manages to transform and ‘domesticate’ an unstructured
Figure 6.4: Problem-structuring trajectories in the four cases
Far from
certainty on
required and
available
knowledge
UP
Leadership and
learning
MSP(g)
2
MSP(m)
2
1
SP
a
Negotiation and
search
3
1
Accommodation
Rule
b
Pre-natal screening
Volgermeerpolder
Swiss drug policy
Wadden Sea
162
a, b
1, 2, 3
1, 2
Close to agreement on
norms and values at stake
Problem-structuring dynamics and meta-governance
or ‘wicked’ problem. As such, the case clearly illustrates the tendency among
politicians and civil servants to entrust policy implementation, under politically
determined constraints, to a closed professional implementation network.
The Volgermeer case shows how, under pressure by an accidental find of
toxic substances and an aroused public opinion, a closed local community of
municipal policy makers and experts had to give up their preferred policy problem
structure; and how it was transformed into a moderately structured problem
with considerable normative consensus, as policy politics was reshaped into an
oligopolistic policy subsystem with competing advocacy coalitions.
Swiss drugs policy saw the thorough unstructuring of a structured problem, a
subsequent restructuring into a moderately structured problem with normative
consensus, and later a relapse into a new hegemonic belief system with its own
newly structured problem.At first, the closed policy community was opened up in
local, but open issue networks to learn about more successful ways of dealing with
drugs issues.These open issue networks quickly institutionalised into oligopolistic,
clearly delineated policy subsystems with one dominating advocacy coalition.The
lasting dominance and political legitimacy of this advocacy coalition entails a new
period of rule by a hegemonic, expert-led group of policy makers.
The Wadden Sea case also is about the breaking up of the hegemonic belief
system and problem structure of a small expert policy-making group of water
managers by a challenging group of proto-ecologists. In the episodes analysed,
the process indeed starts with a learning experience, which unstructures the old
diking and land reclamation policy logic. However, it only adds ecological values
and knowledge to the policy predicament, without a clear, politically legitimised,
but innovative problem structuring.The threatening political impasse is averted by
transforming the unstructured new problem into a moderately structured problem.
This actually condemns a restricted group of policy makers to find procedural
and/or substantive compromises in a long drawn-out process of accommodation
and continued problem structuring.
The need for meta-governance
The second major conclusion is that the dynamics or drift in problem structuring
needs some form of human agency. It is indeed a dialectical process of structure
and agency, mutually constituting each other. In all cases, a longstanding,
institutionalised policy type–network type structure was challenged by new
agents. In the case of prenatal screening, the new agents were medical-professional
innovators, backed up by members of the Health Council; in the Volgermeer case,
it was public opinion and the citizen committee, backed up by the provincial
Inspectorate for Environmental Hygiene; in the Swiss drugs case, it was public
health specialists of the medical profession and youth workers, backed up by some
politicians and civil servants at the federal level; and in the Wadden Sea case, it
was the establishment of a new, ecologically inspired civic association, supported
by scientists and some civil servants.
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The governance of problems
In all cases too, the ‘gear shifts’ from one problem type to the next, from one
type of policy politics to the next, were facilitated by some form of interaction
between macro politics and policy politics. Although the spur for problem reframing
and policy innovation came from inside the standing policy networks, the
challenge was successful due to support from agents working at the interstices
between the policy network and higher administrative and political governance
levels. In the prenatal screening case, it was prudent political manoeuvring by the
Health Department, which transformed the problem into a structured one. In
the Volgermeer case, the provincial Inspectorate and national departmental policy
makers gently nudged the Amsterdam policy makers towards a new problem
framing by offering financial assistance in the clean-up operation. The learning
in open issue networks around drugs problems in Switzerland, similarly, was made
possible by start-up subsidies and seed money from policy makers at the federal
level. In the Wadden Sea case, some enlightened national policy makers saw the
cognitive relevance and political threat of an apparently regional development
for national policy making. Hence, they were able to install interdepartmental
committees with both protagonists and opponents of the new ecological problem
frame, while simultaneously accommodating all parties in a new cognitive and
political process design.
One might consider describing the roles of these agents as policy entrepreneurs.
Roberts and King (1991) define policy entrepreneurs as policy players who
manage to navigate an innovative idea through the agenda-setting, policyadoption and implementation stages of the policy process. Kingdon (1984) sees
policy entrepreneurs as patiently awaiting or bringing about a policy window or
propitious timeframe to push through an innovative policy idea. They actively
work to link the three more or less autonomous dynamics of problems (challenges),
policy (solutions) and politics (political events). Pralle (2003) has broadened
Kingdon’s idea by speaking of policy entrepreneurs’ role as venue shopping.This
is finding a decision setting or a policy network that offers the best prospects
for achieving desired policy change. For example, if Parliament is unwilling to
adopt an innovative policy or Bill, maybe regional or municipal governments, or
expert advisory bodies, offer a better venue (Timmermans and Scholten, 2006;
Hoppe, 2008a). Pralle (2003) has stressed that policy entrepreneurship through
venue shopping is sometimes less a deliberate than an experimental activity; that
some venues are sought not for tactical reasons, but because they better fit the
identity of the policy advocates; and, sometimes, venue shopping takes place not
for tactical or identity reasons but because policy advocates have arrived at a new
understanding of the nature of the policy problem.
None of these definitions of policy entrepreneurship quite captures what
was going on in the above cases as indispensable for the desired policy change.
Pralle’s conception of venue choice due to problem reframing comes closest.
However, the policy entrepreneurs observed above do not shop, but shape venues.
As Baumgartner and Jones (1993) state, under conditions of rapid change and
entrance of new policy players, old policy subsystems crumble (like the creative
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Problem-structuring dynamics and meta-governance
destruction that Schumpeter (1942) thought so characteristic for economic
entrepreneurs) and new policy networks may emerge. In the above cases, policy
entrepreneurs certainly contributed, quite consciously it seems, to the emergence
of new policy networks. Moreover, these networks not only contained a new
set of policy players in different advocacy coalitions. The structure of the policy
network itself was consciously reformed; the policy network shifted from one
type to another one.
In institutionalist theory, this kind of achievement is called ‘institutional
entrepreneurship’ (Garud et al, 2007).The concept was coined by DiMaggio (1988:
14), who held that ‘new institutions arise when organised actors with sufficient
resources see in them an opportunity to realise interests that they value highly’.
Institutional entrepreneurs break down existing practices that reflect the rules,
norms and beliefs of the institutionalised policy network. They pick up the
new meanings of policy practices invented and negotiated in other contexts,
sometimes not immediately policy-related environments. By reframing the
policy problem and rethinking the conditions for this new frame to become
legitimate, they translate the new contextualised meanings into rules, norms and
beliefs that infuse and unite a wider field of action, which may eventually grow
into the performance scripts of repeated activities in a new policy network.This
translation work of institutional entrepreneurs depends on their locus at the
margins or ‘above’ policy networks. Being familiar with more than one policyframing and policy-political logic enables them to think more innovatively than
the network ‘insiders’. In addition, they can draw on financial and communicative
resources outside the normal network structures to bolster their efforts. This
type of policy-cum-institutional entrepreneurship can be designated the metagovernance of problems. Some creative and far-sighted policy entrepreneurs arrive
at the considered judgement that the existing network structures no longer hold
the promise of improved policy-making capacity through ‘repair work’. Only by
becoming institutional entrepreneurs too, through the translation work for the
transition to a new type of policy frame and network structure, policy-making
capacity might again be up to the new challenge.
Although in the cases above, this ambition and insight were conscious, it does
not mean that these policy entrepreneurs were institutional leaders ‘in control’.
What they were doing, gently nudging the existing policy network in a more
desired direction through translation work, was perhaps a necessary, but by no
means a sufficient, condition for bringing about the desired policy innovation.
Meta-governance constitutes the endeavour by politicians or some other policy
entrepreneurs to influence the discourse, the composition and participation modes
of actors, the rules of the game, and the interdependencies between actors in
governance networks (Sørensen and Torfing, 2005: 202-5). But it would be difficult
to draw the line between deliberate meta-governance and political tinkering or
bricolage.The system is simply too complex and self-controlled to be amenable to
meta-governance as top-down steering from a central control unit. In societies
like ours, with complex, overlapping, partially contradictory governance systems,
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The governance of problems
the only way to ‘steer’ is by using the forces and drivers already effective in it;
to ‘interpolate’ small doses of change in such a way that the balance of forces is
changed in the desired direction (Dunsire, 1986; Hood, 1986). This interpolable
balancing style of policy-cum-institutional entrepreneurship is most valuable for
political systems. It is an unobtrusive but essential ingredient of a political system
in the responsive and creative governance of problems.
Notes
This case study is based on Stemerding and Van Berkel (2001), Meijer (2008), Merkx
(2008) and Hoppe (2008a).
1
2
This case study is taken from Hisschemöller (1993: 128-44).
3
This case study is based on Kübler (2001) and Wälti and Kübler (2003).
This case study is based on accounts by Hisschemöller (1993: 145-61) and Turnhout
(2003: 69-82).
4
The Dutch stubbornly hold on to ‘spatial planning’ where the English mean ‘town and
country planning’. I am no exception.
5
Later developments show that this fear was not unjustified, especially when, starting in
1982, Wadden Sea policy was internationalised in a Trilateral Wadden Sea cooperation
with Germany and Denmark (Turnhout, 2003).
6
166
SEVEN
Making policy analysis
doable and reflexive
Scientific method is one important way to make sense of some bits of
human experience, useful where applicable, potentially disastrous when
it is used in an attempt to monopolize discourse. By recognizing the
essentially political purpose of scientific method, we will be better able
to evaluate its contributions and its limits in creating and sustaining
communities of shared meaning. (Sederberg, 1984: 43)
Introduction
Chapters Three through Six dealt with the transition dynamics of the relation
between policy designs and the socio-political contexts of cultures and policy
networks. Now the focus moves to the realms of framing and design dynamics
in the knowledge context of designing policies (see Figure 2.4, Chapter Two).
This knowledge context is made up of three elements:
• citizens’ and civic associations’ experiential constructions of knowledge deemed
relevant for interpreting what policies mean to them;
• the knowledge constructions of practitioners with active roles in policy networks; and
• the constructions of those who deal in a scientific way with problems and policies.
Of course, the knowledge context is a ‘trialogue’ between these three types
of constructions; they all mutually influence each other. The approach to this
intertwined system of knowledge constructions will start from the lens of the
scientific constructions; more particularly, with how academic and professional
policy analysts have proposed to deal with scientific knowledge constructions
methodically and systematically in designing and evaluating public policies.
Policy analysts first thought that they could legitimately limit themselves to
consideration of scientific constructions only.This original position is summarised
in Wildavsky’s (1980 [1979]) aphorism for policy analysis as ‘speaking truth to
power’. In later developments, this original position was thoroughly criticised.
Academic policy analysis acknowledged the poverty of its original position, and
the necessity of including practitioners’ and experiential knowledge accounts into
the problem framings underlying the designs and evaluations of public policies.
This new position suggests that policy analysis is ‘making sense together’ all the
way down (Hoppe, 1999).Yet, the protagonists of ‘making sense together’ all too
often advocate different scientific theories and methodologies for its achievement.
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To the extent that they are interested in research of how policy analysis is actually
done, they select cases that may easily be interpreted in terms of their own
methodological and conceptual preferences (Hajer and Wagenaar, 2003: 33-112).
The empirical study of discovering different modes of making policy analysis
doable in decision and action contexts has hardly begun (Colebatch et al, 2010:
in press).
The first section in this chapter is about the changing scientific landscape in
which policy analysts are supposed to keep speaking truth(s) to power(s) (Radin,
2000; Anderson, 2003). In the second section, epistemological developments that
changed views on the nature of ‘rationality’ and ‘being scientific’ are reviewed.The
third section demonstrates how these changes in epistemology have affected the
academic conceptions of policy analysis. Briefly stated, it has moved away from
a coherent but analycentrist position and taken an argumentative turn. Rather,
under the unifying label of the argumentative turn, it has taken many different
turns.The present situation of the field indeed is better described as a ‘river delta’
of policy orientations, arguing among each other about conceptual, theoretical
and methodological pros and cons. The fourth section sketches a framework
and research strategy for restoring some coherence and pragmatism to the field.
Particularly, this section re-analyses the previous one from the perspective of
making policy analysis doable. The result is a reflexive policy analysis, sensitive
to context, especially to Dunn’s rule of congruence between problem type and
policy-analytic style.
Still speaking truth to power?
Knowledge in and of policy
According to Lasswell (1971), policy science is about the production and
application of knowledge of and in policy. Policy makers who desire to successfully
tackle problems on the political agenda, should be able to mobilise the best available
knowledge.This requires high-quality knowledge in policy. Policy makers and, in
a democracy, citizens, also need to know how policy processes really evolve.This
demands precise knowledge of policy. There is an obvious link between the two:
the more and better knowledge of policy, the easier it is to mobilise knowledge
in policy. Lasswell expresses this interdependence by defining the policy scientist’s
operational task as eliciting the maximum rational judgement of all those involved
in policy making.
For the applied policy scientist or policy analyst, this implies the development of
two skills. Both derive from Lasswell’s notion of policy science as a political idea;
to mobilise (social) science to better solve political questions (Turnbull, 2005: 123).
First, for the sake of mobilising the best available knowledge in policy, the policy
scientist/analyst should be able to mediate between different scientific disciplines.
Second, for the sake of optimising the interdependence between science in and
of policy, they should be able to mediate between science and politics. Hence,
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Dunn’s (1994: 84) formal definition of policy analysis as an applied social science
discipline that uses multiple research methods in a context of argumentation,
public debate [and political struggle, RH] in order to create, critically evaluate,
and communicate policy-relevant knowledge.
Scientisation of politics and politicisation of science
Historically, the differentiation and successful institutionalisation of policy science
can be interpreted as the scientisation of the functions of knowledge organisation,
storage, dissemination and application in the knowledge system (Dunn and
Holzner, 1988). Moreover, this scientisation of hitherto ‘un-scientised’ functions,
by expressly including science of policy, aimed to gear them to the political system.
In that sense, Lerner and Lasswell’s (1951) call for policy sciences anticipated, and
probably helped bring about, the scientisation of politics.
Peter Weingart (1983) claims that the development of the science–policy nexus
can be analysed as a dialectical process of the scientisation of politics/policy and
the politicisation of science. Science Technology and Society (STS) studies can claim
particular credit for showing the latter tendency (Cozzens and Woodhouse, 1995:
551).Applying critical sociology, symbolic interactionism and ethno-methodology
to the innermost workings of the laboratories, STS scholars (Sismondo, 2004) have
shown that the idealist image of science as producer of privileged, authoritative
knowledge claims, supported by an ascetic practice of Mertonian norms for proper
scientific conduct (Commonality or communism, Universalism, Disinterestedness,
Organised scepticism – CUDO for short) is just the outside, legitimising veneer
of scientific practices and successes.
Using interpretive frames from Marxist science studies, conflict theory, interest
theory and social constructivism, a much more realistic perspective on science has
been developed. Instead of Mertonian CUDO-norms, contemporary scientists de
facto behave as if science were Proprietary, Local, Authoritarian, Commissioned
and self-proclaimed Expert (Ziman, 1999 – PLACE). From Olympian heights of
abstraction and curiosity-driven speculation, innovative but stringent experiments,
and Humboldtian institutional autonomy, small-s science came down to earth as
a social movement (Yearley, 1988: 44ff) driven by local and practical, sometimes
openly political, interests. It had become entrepreneurial, fiercely competitive,
speculative, with an ‘anything goes’ methodology, and selling itself to government
and big business in the race for financial resources.
Changes in the ‘covenant’ between science and politics
Thus, the politics of science extended into the political domain. However, it would
be wrong to attribute this just to science’s institutional self-interest.To the extent
that scientists were successful in producing authoritative cosmopolitan knowledge
claims, and upholding them in their translation into successful large technological
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projects, they were invited by politicians and administrators as useful advisers.
Thereby politics paradoxically contributed to its own scientisation.
At first, until the early 1970s, it looked like the science–politics nexus would
be just mutually beneficial.The institutional ‘covenant’ between the two spheres,
aptly named ‘Science, the Endless Frontier’, meant a high degree of institutional
autonomy, lots of resources, and privileged access to political decision making
through advisory positions for science. Politics, impressed by and grateful for
science’s contribution to the war effort and to large infrastructural projects, rested
content in expecting more of the same high pay-offs. As these promises turned
out to be empty or merely disappointing, science’s cognitive authority waned, and
politics gradually revised the covenant by tightening its conditions for financial
support and scientific autonomy.
The new inter-institutional contract has been relabelled ‘Strategic Science’. On the
one hand, politics forces criteria of relevance on scientists, which clearly indicates
the politicisation of science. On the other hand,
[S]cientists have internalized the pressure for relevance, but at the same
time have captured it for their own purposes by claiming a division
of labor. Typical stories emphasize strategic research as the hero at
the core of one or more ‘innovation chains’ where the switch from
open-ended research to implementation would occur. (Rip, 1997: 631)
This, of course, points to the continued scientisation of politics.
Even though numerous studies of political controversies showed that science
advisers behave pretty much like any other self-interested actor (Nelkin, 1995),
science somehow managed to maintain its functional cognitive authority for
politics. This may be due to its changing shape, which has been characterised as
the diffusion of the authoritative allocation of values by the state, or the emergence
of a postparliamentary and postnational network democracy (Andersen and Burns,
1996: 227-51). In such conditions, scientific debate provides a much-needed
minimal amount of order and articulation of concepts, arguments and ideas.
Although frequently more in rhetoric than in substance, reference to scientific
validation does provide politicians, public officials and citizens alike with some
sort of compass in an ideological universe in disarray.
For policy analysis to have any political impact under such conditions, it
should be able to somehow continue ‘speaking truth’ to political elites who are
ideologically uprooted, but cling to power; to the elites of administrators, managers,
professionals and experts who vie for power in the jungle of organisations
populating the functional policy domains of postparliamentary democracy; and
to a broader audience of an ideologically disoriented and politically disenchanted
citizenry. However, what does it mean to ‘speak truth to power’ in contemporary society and
politics? To answer this question, first, some megatrends in epistemological debate
will be highlighted. On that basis, second, its implications for the development
of policy analysis will be delineated.
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Epistemology: from instrumental to fallibilist-pragmatist
rationality
Disenchantment of science
Once upon a time, social, political, managerial and administrative elites genuinely
believed in scientific rationality as a key to solving collective (and personal)
problems. Like scientists themselves, they were inheritors of the Enlightenment,
who pictured unfettered growth of scientific knowledge as the driving force of
social progress and individual ‘pursuit of happiness’. However, after two World
Wars, the Shoah and the Gulag, the nuclear race, the fall of ‘scientific’ communism,
the ecological and, more recently, the financial-economic crisis, belief in scientific
rationality is decaying. In all cases mentioned, science and scientists are, to a greater
or lesser extent, accessory to human suffering and ecological degradation (Ravetz,
2005). For religious fundamentalists and modern neo-tribalists, this suffices to
reject science in a ‘rage against reason’.
Nevertheless, even moderate postmodernists reject claims to ground political
and social ideas in scientific, rational, logical and consistent argument as potentially
exclusive, imposing, suppressive, technocratic and ultimately undemocratic. Instead,
they celebrate otherness, incompatibilities and ruptures between lifestyles, cultures,
discourses, pluralism, the decentred ego, and the uniqueness, contingency and
fragmentation of all social phenomena.
Towards interpretivism
Richard Bernstein (1991) has aptly characterised this new intellectual force field as
the polarity of a ‘both/and’ situation: the modernist idea of the Enlightenment as
‘unfinished project’ and the postmodernist idea of the Enlightenment as ‘historical
error’. They are like opposites that can never be reconciled, yet are inextricably
intertwined in that they mutually elicit and illuminate each other. Therefore,
it is unnecessary to push matters to an extreme. It is more plausible to cast the
modernism–postmodernism divide as different accents within a markedly revised
concept of scientific rationality.
First, the conviction that empirical-analytic scientific procedure alone may lay
claim to scientific rationality has become untenable (Diesing, 1991; Ziman, 2000).
In this (neo)positivist conception, science is based on a strictly neutral, objective,
carefully controlled sense observation of physical and social facts. Long observation
is supposed to uncover regularities and patterns, which, constructed into abstract
hypotheses, are amenable to further rigorous testing. Hypotheses surviving these
further tests may be used in the formulation of deductive systems of law-like
propositions, in which they enter as general premises in the covering-law model
of truly scientific explanation and prediction.
Habermas (1971) has shown that this idea corresponds to just one knowledge
interest constitutive of science, that is, the domain of labour, work and human
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control over a physical or social environment. However, humans know more action
domains, and therefore knowledge interests. Interaction and mutual understanding
of action motives and meanings is a second knowledge interest. It lends the
interpretive and hermeneutic sciences their legitimate claim to scientific rationality.
Where meaningful interactions are suffocated by unconscious collective images
or pre-understandings, which deserve articulation, reflection and critique, there is
a legitimate task for critical science. Empirical analysis of data, skilful interpretation
of socially constructed meanings, and social critique are equally important, vital
elements of an enlarged concept of scientific rationality.
Towards fallibilism
Second, it is acknowledged by scientists that scientific knowledge is fallible. The
Cartesian ‘either/or’ position has been left.Who likes to be considered scientifically
rational can no longer appeal to rocklike cognitive certainties or axioms (be they
God, the Cogito, or sense observation). Modern rationality rests on acknowledging
that ‘although we must begin any inquiry with prejudgments and can never call
everything into question at once, nevertheless there is no belief or thesis – no
matter how fundamental – that is not open to further interpretation and criticism’
(Bernstein, 1991: 327).
Fallibility implies the expectation of being proven wrong, and therefore the
willingness to revise one’s insights. Rationality as openness to learning further
presupposes the embeddedness of the scientist in a durable social context of
dialogue and action.An action context, because only there the pragmatic alternation
between thought and action exists which brings error to light.A context of critical
dialogue, because this catalyses the learning process. It is not accidental, then, that
Habermas, defender of the idea of the Enlightenment par excellence, has strongly
argued the position that genuine cognitive-analytic rationality is unthinkable
absent a rationality oriented towards mutual understanding; a rationality, which,
thus, needs to be social, interactive and dialogical.
Postnormal science Trying to save science from over-cynicism and attempting to preserve its functional
authority to politics/policy, some practice-oriented epistemologists, building on
the above-mentioned new constellation, have moved beyond the futile quest for
clear a priori demarcation criteria to distinguish science from non-science. Instead,
they try to delineate rules for ‘good’ scientific practice in the context of boundary
work at the science–politics nexus (Gieryn, 1995; Jasanoff, 1990). Recognising the
inadequacy of normal applied science and professional consultancy in political
controversies under high uncertainty and high decision stakes over issues that
show emergent complexity, epistemologists Funtowicz and Ravetz (1992) have
proposed new rules for postnormal science. These rules apply when (based on Van
der Sluys, 1997: 21):
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• the research group is under external pressure due to the urgency, high stakes
and disputed values in the decision to be taken;
• established boundaries between the politics/policy and science arenas become
subject to continuous renegotiation (boundary work);
• research is issue driven; there is not one problem, but a tangled web of related
problems; an unstructured problem, for short;
• a multitude of legitimate scientific and ethical perspectives on the issue web
exists; conflicting certainties (appeals to so far fruitful paradigmatic canons,
rules, standards, concepts) co-exist;
• research confronts many large, and partly irreducible, uncertainties; scientists are
confronted with incomplete control and unpredictability of the analysed system.
Under such conditions, Funtowicz and Ravetz recommend application of a finegrained system of types of uncertainty to painstakingly sift out the reducible from
the irreducible uncertainties in order to set feasible research goals and priorities.1
Another recommendation is to strengthen the quality control of scientific
arguments through systems of extended peer review. In fact, following these
proposals would mean to systematise intra-boundary work between scientific
disciplines and groups (interdisciplinary research and internally extended peer
communities) and extra-boundary work between scientists, policy makers and,
sometimes, non-expert citizens (transdisciplinary research and externally extended
peer communities). In the work of Funtowicz and Ravetz we see the implications
of the paradox between the scientisation of politics and the politicisation of science
at a high level of reflexivity.Yet what use is it to policy science and policy analysis?
Policy analysis: from analycentrism to the argumentative turn
Democratic aspirations in early policy science
Policy science is usually traced back to Harold Lasswell’s intellectual underpinning
of the endeavour to systematically and methodically gear the applied (social)
sciences to the needs of long-term, strategic public policy making (Lerner and
Lasswell, 1951; Lasswell, 1971). In Lasswell’s designs the relationship between
policy science and the practice of politics and administration was to be scientific,
democratic and pragmatist.Yet, policy science was not to become a technocratic
strategy in order to substitute politics with enlightened administration; nor was
it a social technology, always at the service of politicians and administrators.
For Lasswell, policy science was a vital element in a political strategy to maintain
democracy and human dignity in a post Second World War world. He follows in
the footsteps of his pragmatist teachers, Dewey and Merriam. In the pragmatist
view, politics is modelled after peer review in science: it is a dialogue between
expert opinion and the opinions of a larger public, in a community united by
the quest for answers to shared problems. Politics is seen as probing and honest
debate, and not as conflict management that succeeds by cleverly exploiting the
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ignorance and incomplete knowledge of citizens. In a sense, political and policy
science’s goal is not to replace ‘ordinary’ political prudence and common sense
with cognitively superior scientific knowledge, but to reinvigorate and systematise
them (Van de Graaf and Hoppe, 1989: 61-3; Torgerson, 1995: 234, 238-9).
Lasswell’s position is remarkable. He had read Freud and Marx, and had been
exposed to war propaganda enough to be sensitive to the realities of ideological
manipulation and the pathological sides of politics. He had even written books
about it (Lasswell, 1927, 1930). He was also keenly aware of the impossibility
of re-embedding political wisdom and prudence in the existing ‘communities’
of post-war America. Yet, Lasswell opted for a policy science in the service of
democracy, and rational, active citizenship, unlike famous contemporaries like
Lippmann, Schumpeter and Dror, who, convinced of the irremediable irrationality
and lack of political common sense of ordinary people, chose the more ‘realistic’
strategy of developing an applied social science for an enlightened political and
administrative elite.
Technocratic aspirations and instrumental rationality
Reality usually disappoints high aspirations. Nevertheless, it is ironic that
policy science’s breakthrough was intimately connected to a half-hearted
post-behavioural turn in political science. Political scientists’ call to recapture
relevance in the face of exaggerated methodological rigour was translated into
curriculum and research programme innovations focusing on the study of
the content, processes, and impacts of public policy. But its purpose remained
technocratic: replacing politicians’ and citizens’ ordinary and local knowledge
of policy and policy making with a new, scientifically validated type of applied,
general knowledge (Torgerson, 1995: 229-30). Better knowledge of causation and
know-how about the application of scientific logic in decision making were the
dominant claims on which the schools of public policy were erected in one after
another US university and, later, in many European countries. Testimony to the
dialectics between the scientisation of politics and the politicisation of science,
the successful institutionalisation of policy science in US academia was partly
due to favourable labour market prospects fuelled by a rising demand for policy
analysis in the Kennedy and Johnson administrations (DeLeon, 1989). In Europe,
similar influences were at work, especially in countries where social-democratic
governments sought far-reaching social, economic and administrative reforms
(Wagner et al, 1991).
From an epistemological point of view, when policy analysis was beginning,
three cross-cutting and non-exclusive currents can be discerned: analycentrism,
neo-positivism and critical rationalism (Dryzek, 1993: 217-22).
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Analycentrism
Analycentric policy analysis claims cognitive superiority over practice based
on the scientific logic and consistency built into analytic techniques like costeffectiveness analysis, cost-benefit analysis, statistical decision theory, and planningprogramming-budgeting. The analycentric policy analyst relies on algorithms,
filled with data and insights from secondary sources, either scientific or practical.
His value-added is merely to see to it that actual decision making follows rigorous
scientific canons of procedural rationality (Behn and Vaupel, 1982). Analycentric
policy analysis has been effectively criticised for its lack of political realism and,
in spite of its alleged procedural neutrality, its introduction of politically biased
assumptions in the guise of ‘technicalities’ (Tribe, 1972; Self, 1975; Wildavsky,
1980 [1979]; Fischer, 1980).
Neo-positivism
Neo-positivist policy analysis grounds its claim to cognitive superiority in its
knowledge of causal links. The attractiveness of a neo-positivist concept of
science is that knowledge of scientific laws, in technical-instrumental fashion,
may be applied to the explanation of the emergence of policy problems and the
prediction of impacts of certain policy interventions. After all, if a policy is a plan
for achieving particular objectives with the help of certain means, certified causal
knowledge is indispensable. For objectives are consequences preferred by policy
makers; and means are their chosen and manipulated causes.
Although the grounding of policy analysis in causal knowledge lingers on, neopositivist policy analysis has withered away.The above-mentioned Habermasean
criticism certainly played a role here. However, applied to policy analysis, neopositivism leads to obvious self-contradictions. If human behaviour generally is
driven by laws governing the behaviour of ordinary people, why grant immunity
of such laws to politicians and policy makers (Bobrow and Dryzek, 1987: 132)?
In addition, neo-positivists overlook that causal knowledge may ‘self-destruct’ the
causal laws on which a policy is based through humankind’s capacity for learning.
Critical rationalism
Critical-rationalist policy analysis shares with neo-positivism its claim to superior
causal knowledge. However, it strongly differs with regard to how to acquire it in
the real world. In this respect, critical-rational policy analysis means an enormous
step towards a fallibilist and learning concept of rationality. Building on Popper’s
falsificationism (Popper, 1963) and his political philosophy of piecemeal social
engineering in an open society (Popper, 1945), Campbell and Stanley (1963) have
developed critical-rational policy analysis into a sophisticated methodology of
(quasi-)experimental impact evaluation. In their view, knowledge acquisition and
progress is an evolutionary process of learning from trial and error in successive
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efforts to compare hypotheses of experimentally generated impacts. This is
true for both ordinary and scientific knowledge. Science is the more efficient
learning strategy due to stricter requirements for the conditions of learning and
the interpretation of results.
Applied to policy making, a policy’s content is seen as a hypothesis, and
implementation is a social experiment. Braybrooke and Lindblom (1963) have
observed such processes of serial policy adjustment in practice. However, unlike
routine practice, in critical-rational policy analysis the controlled nature of the
experiment is of prime importance.This means that policy analysts are responsible
for keeping objectives and conditions for implementation stable during the process.
Afterwards one may compare the impact of an intervention on the properties
of an experimental group to those of a similarly composed control group. Any
differences found may then be attributed to the policy intervention. Repeated
experiments will gradually lead to better knowledge due to error elimination
through criticism of the policy experiments. Ideally, true to the ideals of an open
society, not just the experimenting and evaluating policy analysts, but also those
subjected to the experiment can offer their views and criticisms.
Strengths and weaknesses
Critical-rational policy analysis has many strengths. By conceiving policy as
hypothesis and implementation as experiment, it escapes from the neo-positivist
illusion that delay of action may improve knowledge. The analogy between
policy making and experimenting better fits a political reality of permanent
time pressure and action imperatives. In addition, the doctrine of an open and
experimenting society returns to pragmatist notions of the polity as a community
of problem solvers. In principle, therefore, critical-rational policy analysis escapes
the technocratic tendencies inherent in analycentric and neo-positivist approaches.
Nevertheless, there are several catches to critical-rationalist policy analysis.
Some of the criticism focuses on the incremental or piecemeal nature of policy
experiments and the slow progress of knowledge in implementing the criticalrational programme. It is argued that this does not fit a world of rapid change in
which some policy experiments depend for their success on non-incremental
increases in resources, and on enthusiasm rather than critique. Another type of
criticism addresses the gap between the doctrine of the open, experimenting
society and the practice of quasi-experimental impact evaluation. Stringent
top-down implementation in different sites is a prerequisite for controlled social
experiments. In practice, this justifies and leads to cosy relationships between
reform-minded politicians, administrators and the scientific policy evaluators,
who jointly treat citizens like objects not entitled to any criticism during or after
the experiment (Dryzek, 1993: 220).
The most lethal criticism, however, concerns the analogy to scientific
experiment underlying Popper’s and Campbell’s views. Especially Dunn (1993)
has convincingly shown that the analogy runs into crippling objections if applied
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to social systems and policy problems. Even if reform-minded policy makers and
evaluators go to great lengths in arranging the experiments in such a way that
results that run counter to their expectations and preferences may occur, the
social dynamics of human symbol internalisation and externalisation (Berger and
Luckman, 1967) or structuration (Giddens, 1979) imply that:
experimental [design and, RH] outcomes are unavoidably mediated
by diverse standards of appraisal which are unevenly distributed among
stakeholders in policy reforms.… Social theories, unlike physical ones,
are difficult to falsify with experimental data because the interpretation
of such data is mediated by the assumptions, frames of reference, and
ideologies of social scientists and other stakeholders in reform. (Dunn,
1993: 259-60)
This poses no insurmountable problems in cases of well-structured, rather static
and nearly decomposable policy issues. However, such issues are not the only
type of policy problem, and decrease in frequency (Bobrow and Dryzek, 1987:
148) and urgency (Hoppe, 1989) in contemporary politics. Therefore, it may be
concluded, as a fallibilist and error-eliminating method, critical-rationalism is only
fit for avoiding first-order errors concerning the selection of the better of two or
more causal hypotheses. It is of little significance and help in avoiding secondorder errors of picking the more adequate of two or more problem definitions.
Although some critical-rationalists have embraced methodological multiplism
as a remedy (Dunn, 1994: 8-10), on balance, when it comes to selection of
problem definition and theoretical frames, critical-rationalism relies on ‘qualitative,
common-sense knowing of wholes and patterns’ (Campbell, 1974: 3). Campbell
has conceded that, where the results of a policy experiment frequently remain
open to conflicting and ambiguous interpretations, ‘an experiment is of itself no
more than an argument’ (Campbell, 1982: 330-1).Therefore, it is concluded that
critical-rational policy analysis stopped on the verge of an argumentative turn
(see below).
The post-positivist turn in policy analysis
Somewhere around 1980, policy science’s original wave of success subsided.
Lindblom and Cohen’s (1979) Usable knowledge marks a period where policy
scientists and analysts publicly doubted the value-added for ordinary knowledge
of their professional social inquiry. From the disappointments with analycentric,
neo-positivist and critical-rational policy analysis, Carol Weiss drew the conclusion
that the field is in intellectual crisis:
That social scientists shape the world they study by the way they define
the problem has come to be accepted not only by social scientists but
by sophisticated political actors as well.They are aware that researchers’
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assumptions, theories, and choice of variables can have large effects on
the answer they find. This new understanding throws into doubt the
accommodation [with political and administrative practice, RH] that
earlier generations of social scientists had negotiated. If they no longer
claim to find ‘truth’ about ‘reality’, what is their role in the policy
process? The time seems to have arrived for a new set of assumptions
and arrangements. (Weiss, 1991: 321)
The new assumptions, hardly the new arrangements, had arrived in the shape of
the post-positivist turn.This means that even policy analysts (in the social sciences
a rearguard in leaving the positivist and pure critical-rationalist trenches) admitted
interpretive, hermeneutic and critical approaches to their stock of knowledge
and methods. Policy scholars had to admit that it was impossible to premise
policy analysis on the analogy with science. Policy making could not fruitfully
be studied as the monologic, methodological justification of the ‘right’ answer
to a policy problem. Rather, it dawned on policy scholars that policy making
is a continuous question-and-answer process; with policy analysis in the role of
dialogical justification between people, of both questions and answers. Hence,
in the post-positivist turn, issues of scientific methodology were superseded by
questions of argumentation, dialogue and rhetoric (Turnbull, 2005: 132).
Within the post-positivist turn broadly perceived, four main currents may be
discerned: relativistic, critical, forensic and participatory policy analysis.
Relativism
A relativistic policy analysis can be attributed to the ‘early’ Lindblom and Wildavsky.
Lindblom’s empirically grounded insights into the disjointed incrementalist
practice of policy making (Braybrooke and Lindblom, 1963; Lindblom, 1965,
1968) have always held him back from any enchantment with the idea of the
attainment in practice of a more comprehensive rationality suggested by a
Lasswellian policy science. As a ‘science of muddling through’, the most that
policy analysis could hope for was to provide policy practice with clever strategic
shortcuts and simplifications (Lindblom, 1979). To escape from the dangers of
oversimplification, one had to trust the practice of pluralist politics, its partisan
mutual adjustment, and its trial-and-error learning in the successive limited
comparisons of serial adjustments. Take note that Lindblom’s theory harbours
strong fallibilist and pragmatist convictions. In Usable knowledge (1979) he holds
on to these vital insights.The impact of professional policy analysis is limited, and
adds only modest increments to the ordinary knowledge of politicians and public
officials. Policy analysts are condemned to provide argumentative ammunition
for the rhetorical struggles of politicians (policy analysis as argument or data,
Weiss, 1991); only occasionally they discover a nugget of enlightenment (policy
analysis as idea).
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Wildavsky’s (1980 [1979]) views do not differ much from Lindblom’s, but
they are more optimistic about the ‘art and craft of policy analysis’. After all,
Wildavsky is the founding father of the University of California at Berkeley’s
policy analytic curriculum. Policy analysis Wildavskian style is depicted as a
dialogical and prudential balancing act in which the policy analyst helps both
politicians and citizens find a practical middle ground between the ever-present
tensions of resources and constraints, cogitation and interaction, and dogma and
scepticism. Like Lindblom in his widely acclaimed Politics and markets (1977), in
the beginning of the 1980s, Wildavsky lost his trust in political pluralism as an
error-correcting safety net for biased, incremental policies (Wildavsky, 1987, 1988:
xv-xxi). Prophetically concerned about increasing ideological cleavages among
the US political elite and their impotence to forge a new national consensus,
he turned to grid-group cultural theory to better grasp their diverging political
frames (Douglas and Wildavsky, 1983).
Until 1980, Lindblom and Wildavsky implicitly defended an interpretivehermeneutic approach to policy analysis, in the sense that they, much like
anthropologists among the tribes of policy experts, inquired into the policy
practitioners’ rules for problem definition, policy design, formulation and adoption,
implementation and evaluation. This method accounts for the widespread
acceptance of their empirical findings. Normatively speaking, however, their
approach often meant unquestioned compliance with the rules of thumb and the
supposed checks and balances of pluralist political practice.This is comparable to
a hermeneutic approach to shared traditions and pre-understandings without any
thought of the possibility of ideological, psychopathological or other reprehensible
bias or prejudice (Torgerson, 1995; but see Lindblom, 1990; Lindblom and
Woodhouse, 1993). Many have pointed out that such an uncritical interpretivisthermeneutic approach to policy analysis can lead to a scientifically (Wittrock,
1991) or morally objectionable relativism (Dryzek, 1993).
Critical theory
The relativist approach has been attacked most by a critical-theoretical approach
to policy analysis, advocated by Forester (1985, 1989) and Dryzek (1990, 1993;
Bobrow and Dryzek, 1987). Their main accusation is that relativists disregard
the conditions for consensus formation. Forester blames Wildavsky for failing to
differentiate between political interaction (as a problem-processing strategy in its
own right, in addition to cogitation or analysis) that does and does not elicit true
learning among citizens (Forester, 1985: 265ff). Forester deems this distinction
essential in a political system where common sense and shared meaning can no
longer be presupposed, and groups with clashing political frames of reference
have an interest in maintaining public deception and bias. In a similar criticism,
Hisschemöller and Hoppe (2001: 54ff) point to bureaucratism, technocracy and
econocracy (Self, 1975) as biases among policy makers that hamper learning
processes. Habermas’ communicative ethics, especially his thoughts on the
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ideal speech situation in which people communicate free from power relations,
deception and self-deception, is used as a standard for judging the extent to which
policy makers form a rational and genuine consensus. Policy analysts would have
as their main task to monitor and foster means of authentic consensus formation.
To this end, Fox and Miller (1995: 118-120) have proposed criteria for legitimate
contributions to public debate: sincerity, situation-regarding intentionality, willing
attention, and unique and indispensable expertise.These criteria demonstrate that
the critical policy analyst does not pursue public participation for its own sake.
The analyst advocates discursive pluralism with an eye to the quality of decision
making and the authenticity of consensus formation. Nonetheless, Fox and Miller
admit that in the virtual reality and image-struggles of the contemporary news
industry it is difficult to judge the extent to which political debate observes these
four criteria. Forester (1989) has developed a typology of biased and distorted
policy communication, and corresponding counterstrategies for restoring trust and
authenticity. The implication is that policy analysts themselves ought to see to it
that their own communicative and argumentative practices are in order (Forester,
1989: 148 ff).The art of listening, respectful treatment of target groups, avoidance
of unnecessary ‘officialese’ and other expert discourse, and the craft of initiating
and conducting mutually enlightening debate – such are the professional skills
of the critical-cum-interpretive policy analyst.
Critical analysis is often criticised on two counts. Both regard the dangerous
consequences of giving too much weight to the guiding ideal of the ideal speech
situation (e.g. Pellizzoni, 2001). The first objection is that, however attractive
from a theoretical perspective, these ideals are of limited validity in practice.
Where is the borderline between deception and misunderstanding? Who is to
determine what is the ‘better’ argument? To what lengths should we go in debate
and communication, where we also know that human rationality is bounded and
fragile and, eventually, we have to act? In other words, in all collective decision
making we reach dead-ends, or situations where decisions cannot be made on
cognitive grounds, where debate, reasoning and the force of the better argument
are exhausted, and we have to shift to some form of collective will formation
and legitimate power to bring the process to closure (Hoppe, 1983: 231-35;
Bernstein, 1991: 221-22; Pellizzoni, 2001; see also Chapter Ten for a more extensive
discussion). All political systems are in need of procedures of managing conflicts
irresolvable by debate and reasoned argument. The critical approach to policy
analysis turns a blind eye to this problem.
A second objection is that critical analysis often gets stuck in a form of counterexpertise disinclined to serious mutual reflection and learning. In such cases, the
critical policy analyst just provides rhetorical ammunition for political fights, and
just contributes to polarisation, zigzag policies, and stalemate (Schön, 1983: 34950; Roe, 1994;Van Eeten, 1999). Torgerson (1995: 245) holds that:
[C]ritique turns against both the domain of common understandings
and the restricted nature of technocratic reason.… By … setting
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Making policy analysis doable and reflexive
itself in judgment of common understandings, critique has an ironic
potential to manifest itself as a mirror-image of technocracy.
In addition, a critical policy analyst, although a partisan of ‘the people’, easily
overlooks or downplays divergent opinions among ordinary citizens.
Forensic analysis
For the forensic policy analyst this danger is non-existent (Fischer, 1980, 1995;
Dunn, 1983, 1993; Paris and Reynolds, 1983; Schön, 1983; Jennings, 1987; Schön
and Rein, 1994; Parsons, 1995: 440-4;Torgerson, 1995).To them, it is self-evident
that, like in post-empiricist epistemology after Kuhn or the conditions for postnormal science specified by Funtowicz and Ravetz, policy practice is flooded by
different thinking styles, diverging interpretive frames, competing policy belief
systems, various ideologies, alternative professional paradigms, different worldviews,
contrasting images of humankind and nature, multiple perspectives and so on. Such
frames (Schön and Rein, 1994) are clusters of interlocking causal and normative
beliefs, whose functions are at once cognitive, communicative, interest-driven,
and expressive of one’s identity.To infuse a polyvalent world with meaning, sense
and purpose, and to make action and judgement possible at all, people need such
frames as a sort of mental grappling hook. For instance, professional frames have
been labelled the languages and cultures of ‘tribes of experts’ (Dryzek, 1993: 222),
which create ‘contradictory certainties’ (Schwarz and Thompson, 1990). What
people ‘see’, deem ‘relevant’, and judge ‘persuasive evidence’ on the basis of such
frames, may indeed render them almost beyond comparison or translation.
The forensic policy analyst considers it their task to use the differences between
frames to forge an innovative policy design from a combination of plausible and
robust arguments (frame-reflective analysis), or to test and bolster some frames
(frame-critical analysis, like in Mason and Mitroff, 1981; Paris and Reynolds, 1983).
Ideally, following rules of hermeneutic policy evaluation for arriving at shared
constructions with policy stakeholders (Guba and Lincoln, 1989), and acting on
the precepts of reflective practitionership (Schön, 1983), analysts marry framereflection and frame-criticism in an optimal mix of hermeneutic and critical
moments in policy analysis.
Forensic analysts do not unreflectively impose a particular professional or
political frame on a problematic situation. Rather, they consider any problem as
unstructured to begin with (see chapter Three).The challenge of good analysis is
structuring problems in a simultaneous process of reflection, action and political
strife (Hisschemöller and Hoppe, 1995/1996). Schön (1983) and Schön and Rein
(1994) depict the forensic approach as an iterative itinerary among three forcefields: a continuous process of tinkering or bricolage between the policy analyst/
designer, the policy design and its wider environment, in which the policy design
ought to eventually function independently of the analyst/designer.
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The process of analysis and design cannot be a straightforward one. Rather,
the idea is to sustain creativity in one’s response to empirical uncertainties and
normative ambiguities in an ever-changing world. Neither goals nor means
are fixed; they are transactionally constructed over and over again in intelligent
deliberation and political argument, in a process of ‘naming and framing’ (Schön,
1983: 40-8, 68), which may repeatedly unsettle and attack apparently dominant
concepts and frames of meaning.
It is obvious that the forensic approach, especially one that successfully combines
frame-analysis, frame-reflection and frame-criticism, fully corresponds to the
enlarged concept of rationality as learning.Yet, the approach faces serious hazards.
First, although some authors go to considerable lengths in describing and
prescribing rules of thumb, adequate skills and examples of best practice (Schön,
1983; Schön and Rein, 1994; Grin et al, 1997; Hoppe and Peterse, 1998; Fischer,
2003; Loeber, 2004), the forensic approach remains relatively uncodified. This
means that replication and error detection and elimination are weak. Partially, this
is due to the nature of hermeneutics, critical theory and neo-pragmatism, which
all believe that it is ‘contexts all the way down’. This belief breeds scepticism,
and sometimes downright rejection of codifying rules and formulating anything
beyond the most general precepts of an approach to analysis.
Second, more than any other, the forensic approach is caught in a tension
between the demands of good analysis and the daily practice of politics and
public administration. The critical-rationalist and the relativist policy analyst
uncritically adjust to common practice in the role of trusted adviser of the
politico-administrative elite; and even the critical analyst easily slips into the role
of a counter-expert. It is far more difficult to carve out an acceptable niche for a
forensic analyst as ‘counsellor’ (Jennings, 1987) or ‘participatory expert’ (Fischer,
1993). Much more thought ought to be given to the institutional aspects of
forensic policy analysis (George, 1980; Halffman, 2008). This is why, above, it
was argued that the new post-positivist epistemological assumptions may be
considered in place, but the new institutional arrangements for developing and
implementing them in practice are slow in arriving. It is a question grappled with
more extensively in Chapter Nine.
Participatory approach
A fourth, participatory current in post-positivist policy analysis should also be
distinguished. Theoretically, this current is heterogeneous in that participatory
analysts appeal to relativist, critical and forensic concepts and themes.What unites
their paradigm is a principled selection of a fairly elaborate range of participatory
analytic techniques, in which citizens qua citizens play important roles (Mayer,
1997).
Primarily those inspired by critical theory insist on the intrinsic merit of direct
citizen participation in political decision making.They justify participatory analysis
by claiming that it vitally contributes to participatory democracy as the only
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rational form of life for policy scientists and true democrats (Torgerson, 1986;
Dryzek, 1990). These analysts systematically favour participatory techniques in
which a somehow representative panel of citizens is at the heart of the analytic
process, like methods for conducting consensus conferences (Klüver, 1995) or
planning cells (Dienel, 1992). The policy analyst’s role is to serve and bolster
citizens’ policy recommendations (Hoppe and Grin, 1995: 101-2).
Relativist, critical and forensic analysts value participatory analysis for
instrumental and contextual reasons. They specify three situations in which the
use of participatory techniques is indispensable:
• when a policy problem addresses citizens’ actions upfront, and finding an
acceptable solution depends on appealing to and mobilising citizens’ knowledge
of local or regional conditions;
• when policy issues have a strong ethical component (where experts have no
privileged knowledge to bring to bear on the problem), or directly pertain to
citizens’ needs and wants;
• when experts are strongly divided over an issue.
Those who view participatory analysis more as an instrument than a goal per se,
will prefer participatory techniques, which produce structured debate between
citizens, politicians, officials, interest group representatives and experts, like scenario
workshops (Mayer, 1997) and propositions debates (Hoppe and Grin, 1999).
Here, the analyst remains in control of the analytic process; citizens’ participation,
in certain situations and under particular conditions, vitally contributes to the
information base, validity or representativeness of the analyst’s interpretation of
public debate and their recommendations.
The advantages of participatory analysis are obvious. In the three conditions
mentioned, citizens’ input to analysis is equally, or even more important than
the experts’. Methods of participatory analysis are excellent means of harnessing
citizens’ ordinary knowledge to analytic purposes. Participatory methods are
hardly disputed as expansion of the toolkits of relativist, critical and forensic policy
analysis.The most important criticism is that it is far from beyond doubt whether
citizen participation actually improves and enriches the quality of policy debate.
Formal evaluations document that citizens rate the quality of participatory debates
systematically higher than policy makers and experts (Mayer, 1997: 138-40). In
the absence of objective measurement and evaluation grounded in argumentation
theory, it is difficult to judge the extent to which such ratings are based on selfinterested prejudice by policy makers and experts.
More fundamental criticism remains focused on the aspirations for participatory
democracy. In spite of the impressive possibilities of the interactive use of
contemporary information and communications technology, the practical
objections to participatory democracy are likely to stay.The results of participatory
analytic exercises, even when the size of citizen panels runs to the hundreds or
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thousands (like in some recent applications), will never be able to claim the same
representativeness as elections, referendums or even large-scale opinion surveys.
In that sense, policy science and analysis still face the dilemma between serving
either participatory democracy and active citizenship, or an allegedly enlightened
political and policy-making elite of the administrative state – a dilemma that is
as urgent as ever, now that the political means for ‘making sense together’ look
very fragile in the face of the fragmentation, incommensurabilities, ruptures and
confusions between value systems and worldviews.
Towards pragmatic and reflexive policy analysis
Doable policy work
Policy analysis has moved from ‘speaking truth to power’ to a ‘river delta’ of
different modes of ‘making sense together’ (Hoppe, 1999). Yet, somewhere
during this journey, the coherence of the field was lost. Both recently published
handbooks of public policy studies (Fischer et al, 2007; Moran et al, 2008) share
the view that there is not one story to tell, and all different stories are irredeemably
contestable.The idea of gradual progress towards more and better policy-analytic
professionalism (like in Radin, 2000) is contested. Policy ‘analysis’ may be a far
too lofty, rationalistic, over-intellectualised label for all kinds of hard and not-sorational, down-to-earth ‘work’ that makes policy (Colebatch, 2006a; Colebatch
et al, 2010: in press). Policy analysts ought to radically rethink the idea of one
overarching and dominating type of rationality (Wagner, 2007:38). Instead of a
history of the policy orientation of professionals, we have a story of the plurality
and incommensurability between policy orientations (Torgerson, 2007: 25-6).
Indeed, some students of public policy doubt the sustainability of policy analysis
as a coherent academic field, and explore its viability as a ‘diaspora’ of policy
scholars distributed over many interdisciplinary research groups (see the special
issue of Policy Sciences, 2004; also Korsten and Hoppe, 2006).The least that can be
observed is that the debate on policy analysis is conducted in a highly fragmented
way (Mayer et al, 2004: 170). Another observation is that there is little effort to
restore some kind of shared understanding of the field.
One promising move in this direction is a small article by Mayer et al (2004). It
contains a number of fruitful ideas for what, through lack of a better term, might
be called pragmatic reflexive policy analysis. It is pragmatic because it puts doability
of policy analysis centre stage. It is reflexive, because it enables a questioning of
the underlying ideals and methodologies in policy analysis. What follows is an
interpretation of that article.
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Core activities in policy analysis
Mayer et al (2004: 171-8) begin by identifying six major clusters of activities
that can be observed to constitute the building blocks of most types of real-life
policy analysis:
•
•
•
•
•
•
research and analyse;
design and recommend;
advise strategically;
clarify values and arguments;
democratise;
mediate.
These activities are elaborated below, illustrated by underlying political values,
quality criteria, and images of the ‘good’ policy analyst and their audience. The
attentive reader will easily recognise the theory- and methodology-informed
positions sketched in the previous historical overview.Yet, because the organising
principle is no longer paradigmatic watersheds in academic textbooks, but has
shifted to observable core activities in real-life policy work, they will also detect
some initial blurring of the battle lines.
Research and analyse
Has the number of cases of driving under the influence of alcohol
increased compared to previous years? Has privatisation of public
utilities and services led to lower prices for consumers? Is our climate
really changing? And if so, how is it likely to affect coastal regions?
(Mayer et al, 2004: 174)
Policy analysts who research and analyse are objective researchers who care
about the quality of knowledge. Good knowledge equals sound science, that
is, it withstands scientific scrutiny as ordinarily understood: there is a clear
distinction between subject and object in a realist ontology, empirical knowledge
is variable-oriented, quantified, preferably codified information, and usable
through validated models of causal relationships: ‘Policy analysis will be judged
by substantive (scientific) quality criteria such as validity and reliability, the use
and integration of state-of-the-art knowledge, the quality of data gathering and
the formal argumentation and validation of conclusions’ (Mayer et al, 2004: 184).
Policy making is a neatly ordered, logical sequence of thinking steps; each phase
in the policy-making process builds on the previous one, and is duly supported
by sound research and analysis.
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Design and recommend
What can the government do to improve the accessibility of large
cities? What measures can municipalities take to improve local safety?
How can the container storage capacity in harbor areas best be
increased – by improving utilisation of existing capacity or by creating
more capacity? (Mayer et al, 2004: 174)
Here, the good policy analyst is the impartial, expert adviser whose loyalty is
to the professional or academic peer community, not to the client or principal
(Hoppe and Jeliazkova, 2006: 41). Not quite a believer in sequentially ordered
policy making, they nevertheless meticulously dissect the political arena through
network analysis and stakeholder analysis, that is, the analysis of interests, belief
systems, resource interdependencies, other power relations, and strategies of
different stakeholders. Policy analysts who also recommend and advise believe
that their work ‘will be judged by instrumental criteria of policy relevance, such
as usability and accessibility for policy makers, action orientation and utilisation,
presentation and communication of advice, weighing up of alternatives, clear
choices and so on’ (Mayer et al, 2004: 185). In a political process-driven and
design-oriented way, they use their knowledge to give advice that aligns good
‘analysis’ and good ‘politics’ (Prasser, 2006).
Clarify arguments and values
Why, or more accurately about what, is there a clash of opinions
between supporters and opponents of river dike enforcement or the
expansion of a National Airport? What values and arguments come to
the fore as regards approving or rejecting developments in the field of
modern genetic technology, as in the case of pre-natal diagnosis and
cloning? (Mayer et al, 2004: 175)
The good analyst is well trained in logic, ethics, philosophy and narrative analysis,
and sensitive to metaphor, analogy, story lines and symbolism. Putting these skills
to good use, the value conflicts and argumentation systems often tacitly driving
policy debates are unearthed. This knowledge is fed into the policy-making
process in order to enrich the quality of debate. Frequently, this means that the
governmental policy-making process is no longer the central focus of analysis.
In keeping with the expansion of the policy-making function to external players
in expanded governance systems, public debate in civil society becomes pivotal:
Policy analysis will be judged by quality of argumentation and debate
criteria such as formal logic (consistency), informal logic (rhetoric and
sophism) and quality of the debate in terms such as richness, layering,
and openness of arguments. (Mayer et al, 2004: 185)
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Making policy analysis doable and reflexive
Provide strategic advice
What should a government minister do to bring about acceptance of
road pricing plans? What strategy can a government minister adopt
to allocate radio frequencies? (Mayer et al, 2004: 176)
The analyst who defines himself as client/policy advocate (Hoppe and Jeliazkova,
2006: 40) continuously worries about the question‘What is best for my client,
or the problem-owner?’. Contrary to policy analysis as clarifying values and
arguments, strategic policy advice is narrowly focused on the players, circumstances,
power relations and causal drivers shaping a client’s or principal’s environment.
Whereas for the other types concepts like objectivity and neutrality are still a
source of professional identity, in the eyes of the advocates these ‘old-fashioned’
views only create conflicts between politicians and civil servants. For this type of
analysis, the conflict between professionalism and loyalty is solved by the attitude:
our professionalism is completely in service of our commissioner or principal –
either due to loyalty, or motivated by monetary reward. Mayer et al (2004: 185)
state that, in policy analysis for strategic advice, success is judged
by pragmatic and political effectiveness criteria such as the ‘workability’
of advice, political clearness and proactive thinking, greater insight
(for the client) in the complex environments (political and strategic
dynamics, forces and powers), targeting and achievement of goals.
Democratise
How can citizens receive more and better information about how
to have their say in decisions regarding important social issues like
genetic technology or a new metro line? How can citizens make an
informed choice when it comes to a tricky and difficult question like
the reconstruction of a railway station area? (Mayer et al, 2004: 177)
The good policy analyst is preoccupied by the question ‘How to improve
democracy in society and in politics?’.Therefore, he is a champion of democracy,
either more deliberation or more participation oriented. Ideals such as impartiality,
neutrality or value-free analysis have no place here.The political and governance
system’s bias in favour of political, economic and scientific elites should be
corrected. Hence, the good analyst is an advocate for democratising expertise,
using scientific and professional knowledge for the empowerment of ‘ordinary’
people as citizens:‘Policy analysis will be judged by democratic legitimacy criteria
such as openness and transparency of the policy making process, representation
and equality of participants and interests, absence of manipulation and so on’
(Mayer et al, 2004: 185).
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The governance of problems
Mediate
How can industry and government agree on the moderation of their dispute about
the possible harm caused by zinc emissions to the environment and health? How
can they deal with conflicting findings of scientific research on this matter? What
is a good process for exploring the future of a municipality with all stakeholders
such as citizens, businesses and so on? (Mayer et al, 2004: 177)
The good analyst provides plausible answers to two interlinked
questions, one substantive, the other procedural: ‘What is good for
mutual understanding between different stakeholders? What is good
for the process of consensus building?’ A policy analyst knows their
way around in the worlds of negotiation, mediation, process facilitation
and network management. They are well aware that their work will
be judged ‘by external acceptance and learning criteria such as the
agreement that mutually independent actors reach on the process and/
or content, support for and commitment to the negotiating process
and solutions, learning about other problem perceptions and solutions’
(Mayer et al, 2004: 185).
Styles of doing policy analysis
Having indicated core activities in real-life policy analysis, Mayer et al take a
decisive further step: they propose to think in terms of styles of doing policy analysis.
In their view, such styles should be thought of as combinations of two or more
core activities:
• a rational style, or research and analysis combined with recommendation and
advice;
• an argumentative style, or research and analysis while also clarifying values
and argument systems;
• a client advice style, mixing recommendation and advice on a policy problem
with strategic advice for a principal;
• a participatory style, attempting to introduce the critical clarification of values
and arguments into the democratisation of expertise;
• a process management style, linking up mediation and strategic advice; and
finally
• an interactive style, in which mediation for mutual understanding and consensus
building is linked to democratisation efforts.
The underlying idea is, like in the social study of science and technology (e.g.
Sismondo, 2004), but also in Colebatch’s (2002a, 2006a, 2010) rethinking of
policy analysis as policy work, that observers just register without scientific
prejudice what the actors are actually doing. What they are doing usually can be
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Making policy analysis doable and reflexive
described as making theoretically and methodologically highly complex sets of
activities doable in a specific action context. This requires pragmatic alignments
between the sometimes difficult-to-reconcile theoretical and methodological
requirements of these activities; and, simultaneously, finding alignments with the
practical constraints arising from the action context (Fujimura, 1987). It follows
that in describing what is going on in ‘policy analysis’, observers have to treat
scientific, professional, experiential and even lay knowledge symmetrically, that
is, treat each knowledge type as equally important and informative for what is
going on, both in ‘analysis’ and in the contextual setting.
Like laboratory scientists who engage in practices not necessarily reflecting the
methodological precepts or textbooks of their discipline, policy analysts do not do
exactly what they say or write they will do, or have done. Frequently, they find
themselves unable to follow the precepts of their ‘sacred’ texts. Time is running
out; data are unavailable; personnel are too unskilled or are too small numbers;
money is in short supply; decision makers are too impatient and too interfering
– and numerous other conditions that militate against methodology-and-theory
maximising performance levels.
What actually happens is that analysts, in a very pragmatic and context-dependent
way, and more or less successfully, make policy analysis doable as a mix of core
activities (see Hoppe, 1983; Jasanoff, 1990; Noordegraaf, 2000; Colebatch, 2006a;
De Vries, 2008).2 In quantitative empirical research of types of policy analysts, the
mixed core activities show up in the considerable number of professional norms
and attitudes shared by all types; and in statistical intercorrelations or overlap
between types (Durning and Osuna, 1994; Hoppe and Jeliazkova, 2006; Wolfe,
1997;Van Coppenolle, 2006). Confirming the importance of ‘double vision’ for
reflective practitionership (Schön, 1983), Hoppe (2008b) found that especially
the more experienced and academically articulate analysts designate themselves
as adherents of more than one or two schools of thought; or practising more than
one or two basic policy-analytic activities.
What Mayer et al have justifiably done is to distinguish between some typical,
frequently observed combinations that jointly produce styles in doing policy
analysis. In Figure 7.1 (page 190), these styles are depicted as pragmatic ‘knots’
between pairs of core activities.The styles are ‘suspended’ between the differential,
sometimes quite antagonistic, requirements of the core activities; and each
style is characterised by some kind of practical, context-dependent alignment
of the resulting tensions. To bolster the plausibility of Mayer et al’s theoretical
construction, illustrations from empirical work are given.
The rational style is ‘research and analyse’ joined to ‘design and recommend’.
Analysts in the bureaucracy who can be designated as neo-Weberians (Hoppe and
Jeliazkova, 2006: 40;Van Coppenolle, 2006) adhere to the rational style. If they are
working for policy outside, but in service of governmental policy making, they
are often called objective technicians, or issue specialists (Meltsner, 1976; Wolf,
1997; Hoppe, 2008b).Their professional self-image is to provide politicians, other
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The governance of problems
civil servants, advisers and stakeholders with evidence-based intelligence, that is,
information based on available and usable sound science.
Figure 7.1: Styles of doing policy analysis as ‘knots’ of two core policy-analytic
activities
RATIONAL
STYLE
Puzzling-oriented
Research and
analysis
ARGUMENTATIVE
STYLE
Clarifying norms
and arguments
PARTICIPATORY
STYLE
Reliable, valid Actionable,
usable
knowledge
knowledge
Design and
recommendation
CLIENT
ADVICE STYLE
Understanding values
behind the ‘facts’;
quality of debate
Open debate,
equality of
participants
and interests
Political
expediency,
goal finding
Acceptance of
process,
content,
feasibility
Democratisation
Strategic
advice
PROCESS
MANAGEMENT
STYLE
Mediation
Powering-oriented
Idealistic
INTERACTIVE STYLE
Pragmatic
Source: Slightly amended version of figure 3 in Mayer et al (2004: 184)
Examples are economics-trained or -inspired analysts who see in cost-benefit,
cost-effectiveness and multi-criteria decision analysis the exclusively valid
policy-analytic methods; and who believe in (simulation) models as preferred
way of encapsulating scientific knowledge and predicting policy effects. Another
good example is the adherents of quantitative indicators for auditing in public
management, quasi-experimental programme evaluation or, more generally,‘hard’
evidence-based policy. It bears stressing that rational-style policy analysts differ
from each other on their exact role in the political context, which influences their
work. Some would dispose of any political influence in the name of objectivity
and impartiality; others strongly believe that their expertness entitles them to
some political authority and influence.
The argumentative style attempts to intertwine normative analysis through the
clarification of norms and values with evidence-oriented research and analysis.
This type of analyst may be considered to be a ‘policy philosopher’ (Hoppe and
Jeliazkova, 2006).They consciously keep some distance from politics, in order to
take a critical stance if necessary: ‘You have to show that there is another reality
out there next to the one of the policy decision-maker-politician.’ A central
part of the work of the policy philosopher is to become aware and to make
others aware of other possible worldviews and their implications. Alternatively,
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Making policy analysis doable and reflexive
this type of policy analyst may be designated as a ‘mega-policy strategist’. Their
professional catchphrase is ‘Let’s challenge government to think!’ They claim a
government-oriented think-tank function. They verify and critically examine
strategic policy guidelines and assumptions, in light of the most recent sound
science and arguments (Hoppe, 2008b). It is obvious that this role is anathema to
most middle-ranking officials (Page and Jenkins, 2005; Van Coppenolle, 2006).
Yet, high-ranking civil servants, experts in prestigious think tanks and even in
commercial policy consultancies often claim this role.
The client advice style couples design and recommendation to strategic advice.
This style is typical for analysts, generalists and specialists alike, who are also political
and bureaucratic realists.They are called client advocates or client counsellors or
policy advisers (Wolf, 1997; Hoppe and Jeliazkova, 2006;Van Coppenolle, 2006;
Hoppe, 2008b). They consider it their main task to defend the interests of their
commissioners. They keep their personal opinions to themselves, but have no
trouble in shading analysis in their principals’ interests by foregrounding certain
facts and prioritising some arguments in such ways that, without actually biasing
policy analytic reports, they bend conclusions and recommendations towards
their principals’ positions.The advocates justify their name because they strongly
believe that the policy analyst is a producer of policy arguments, more similar to
a lawyer than to an engineer or a scientist (Hoppe and Jeliazkova, 2006). Others
would rather frame their roles as intermediaries or boundary spanners between
expert advisers and their (political, bureaucratic) principals. In those cases, their
advice is less politically shaded; instead, it stresses both political acceptability and
organisational feasibility of policy proposals, incorporating usable, best available
knowledge on ‘what works’ (Hoppe, 2008b). Yet, more than all other styles,
the client advice style legitimises its role in the process of policy formation by
appeal to the allocation of responsibility and authority in the regular political
and bureaucratic system.
The process management style mixes the substantive task of providing strategic
advice and the procedural challenge of good mediation. This style is engaged
in by analysts who are called process director (Hoppe and Jeliazkova, 2006; Van
Coppenolle, 2006), process facilitator, process manager or even network manager.
Process directors face the same dilemma as most other types of policy analysts:
to find a balance between their attitude towards the principal and their own
convictions.They find involvement in the politics of policy making self-evident.
The areas of their expertise are process management and process monitoring.
The art of tactful steering and well-developed negotiating skills are fundamental
parts of their craftsmanship. Mayer et al (2004: 181) describe the professional
convictions of process managers as:
based on the assumption that substantive aspects of the policy problem
are, in fact, coordinate or perhaps even subordinate to the procedural
aspects…. [He/she] creates ‘loose coupling’ of procedural … and
substantive aspects of a problem.… If the procedural sides … have
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been thought through properly, it will greatly increase the likelihood
of substantive problems being resolved.
This policy-analytic style is observed in (Continental) European governance
systems and appears conspicuously absent in the Anglo-Saxon world (but see
accounts of US foreign policy making in Halperin, 1974; George, 1980).
The interactive style attempts to bridge the impartiality required in mediation
and the partisanship needed for democratising policy analysis. Mayer et al (2004:
180-1) link this style to forensic policy analysis through continuous interaction
and communication between analysts and stakeholders, leading to mutual
learning processes. In a study on discourses on policy analysis in the boundary
work between scientific expert advisers and analysts in the bureaucracy, Hoppe
(2008b) found two types that fit the description in Mayer et al (2004) rather well.
One type he called deliberative proceduralists, whose professional catchphrase
is ‘Organise frank debate between robust parties’. Analysts engaging in this style
actively organise consultative and debating processes conforming to criteria for
open and frank debate between robust parties, be they scientists, stakeholders,
citizens, politicians or even dissidents.
The other style of policy analysis approaching the forensic ideal-type in
practice was called postnormalist. Postnormal policy analysts insist on discussing
the quality of all information and knowledge on the policy table, especially the
uncertainties involved. Such discussions should not be limited to experts and
officials; all involved stakeholders in interactive learning processes should open
themselves up to ‘extended peer review’. It would seem that postnormal analysts
are influenced by and attracted to a conception of interdisciplinary, postnormal
science (Funtowicz and Ravetz, 1992) emerging in fields like ecology and other
domains affected by complexity science. In the US and Canada too, it has been
found that ecology-inspired experts working in sustainability-related policy
domains are open to views on science and policy analysis that are best described
as ‘postnormal’ (Steel et al, 2004: 9).
The participatory style, finally, attempts to draw the analytical, argumentative
clarification of values and argument lines into policy analysis as an effort to resist
elitist bias and democratise expertise. It is concerned to turn democratised analysis
into an asset in the service of citizens. Obviously, this style of doing policy analysis
leads to difficult-to handle tensions between the facilitative and partisan roles of
the analyst. These will be discussed at length in Chapter Nine.
Reflexivity in policy analysis
It is obvious that the list of six styles of doing policy analysis as ‘knots’ between
analytic core activities is not meant to be exhaustive. The scientific literature
mentions other types not listed here, such as issue advocate (Durning and Osuna,
1994;Wolfe, 1997), spin doctor, linking pin (Van Coppenolle, 2006), political realist
(or ‘politician’) (Meltsner, 1976; Wolf, 1997) and knowledge broker (Hoppe,
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Making policy analysis doable and reflexive
2008b). In addition, Mayer et al have shrewdly positioned the different styles at
the angles of their hexagonal model. They have only explored adjacent styles,
which, in their view, are more easily combined than styles lying further apart.
Systematic research along theoretical assumptions outlined in the frame work of
Figure 7.1 will be needed to make the picture richer and more complete.
In spite of its shortcomings, Figure 7.1 opens up possibilities for reflexive
policy analysis. First, and perhaps foremost, the helicopter view of modes of doing
policy analysis and their potential interrelationships offered in the hexagon model
counteracts the loss of an overall perspective on policy analysis as an academic field.
Second, it manages to do so from the angle of making analysis doable in practical
contexts – not from an apodictic theoretical or methodological point of view.This
is important because the loss of an overall view and the highly conceptual and
methodological ‘dialogue of the deaf ’ between the different schools of thought
endangered their relevance for policy-analytic practice.
Third, the framework makes it possible to design innovative policy analytic
methods, and analyse and evaluate their use. For example, Stirling (2006) has
designed a policy-analytic method – multi-criteria mapping – which crossfertilises the rational style of multi-criteria decision analysis and the interactive style
of stakeholder consultation and deliberation. It has been applied by the European
Heart Network, commissioned by the European Commission, to design policy
on the problem of preventing obesity among the young:
The … methodology [multi-criteria mapping, RH] involves scoring
the options under different conditions, according to various criteria,
and with the criteria weighted for their importance. An important
feature of this approach is that the criteria used to judge the options
can differ between the different participants, and can reflect each
participant’s judgments on what is important in policy development.
Based on their scoring of the options, the options can be ranked,
and the top-ranking options discussed as being commonly agreed by
consensus as the most strongly supported, and the bottom-ranking
options agreed as the least strongly supported. (Lobstein et al, 2006: 37)
As the rational and interactive styles of doing policy analysis are on opposite ends
of the hexagonal model, it may be inferred that this is an original, but also risky
policy-analytic design (e.g. Yearley, 2001; Tompkins, 2003). For example, multicriteria decision analysis knows fairly transparent algorithms for aggregating single
scores in an overall end-ranking of alternative options.What happens in the case
where these scores are allowed to have different weights for different participants,
but analysts still write up the ‘final’ score?
Finally, the framework may also help in applying Dunn’s rule of methodological
congruence, that is, in deciding which style of policy analysis, with its concomitant
toolkit of methods and heuristics, is in principle appropriate given one’s politicoadministrative judgement on the type of policy problem at hand (see Figure 7.2).
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The governance of problems
Figure 7.2: Styles of doing policy analysis and problem types
Far from
certainty on
required and
available
knowledge
UP
MSP(g)
Interactive AND/OR
Participatory AND/OR
Argumentative styles
Rational AND/OR
Client advice AND/OR
Process management styles
MSP(m)
SP
Argumentative AND/OR
interactive styles
Rational style
Close to
certainty ...
Far from
agreement ...
Close to agreement on
norms and values at stake
Neither personal inclination, nor methodological convictions, nor political context
should determine which style of policy analysis will be applied. The typology
of six styles of doing policy analysis, in the different ways just illustrated, invite
practitioners to self-consciously reflect on the bases that underlie their reasoning
in designing and applying a particular style.They may make doing policy analysis
more reflexive.
Notes
See Van der Sluys (1997: 173ff) for an application of this so-called NUSAP procedure to
uncertainties in integrated assessment models of global climate change.
1
Lindblom, in keeping with his own teachings, was not very specific in articulating the
method through which he arrived at his formulation of the theory of incrementalism or
the branch method of doing policy analysis. Yet, from the scarce references to his own
practical experience (in Braybrooke and Lindblom, 1963), one may well believe that he
used the method of observant participation and other techniques we would now describe
as ethno-methodological.
2
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EIGHT
The plural democracies of problems:
a meta-theory
The differentiation of the political … follows from the fact that more
and more modes of representation, types of supervision, procedures of
monitoring, and manners of expression of preferences are becoming
available…. (Rosanvallon, 2006: 221)
Introduction
Previous chapters have approached problem structuring in a policy- or
programme-centred way. In the next two chapters, the focus is broadened to a
polity-centred approach (Skocpol, 1992). If there are different types of public
problems, the normative implication seems to be that political regimes should be
able to equally well handle all four policy problem types. However, are polities
robust against all problem types?
Representative and aggregative democracy frequently appears wedded to
the metaphysics of a unified political will of ‘we-the-people’, to be uniformly
imposed on a ‘generalised’ citizen. Therefore, democratic systems are adept in
handling routine issues of large-scale interest articulation and negotiation, and
issues that can be handed over for standardised treatment to professional groups,
specialists and the legal system. But they look less well equipped to deal with the
intractable controversies that frequently emerge around ethically divisive issues
and ‘wicked’, or unstructured, problems (Schön and Rein, 1994; Hoppe, 2008a).
The ‘particularised’ men in contemporary emancipated civil society need more
appropriate, innovative institutional and process designs for more deliberative
and integrative elements in democracy. The key is to unlearn to conceive of
democracy in a singular way, and to learn to see it in a pluralist way.
Day-to-day practice of democracy requires different modes of democratic
governance to successfully deal with different structures of problems. This
argument will unfold in this chapter in several steps.The first section stresses and
elaborates the findings of Chapter Six: policy change frequently comprises both
substantive frame shifts and instrument choice, and shifts in governance, that is, shifts
in network type. However, state-centred public administration, or managerialist
theories of network management and procedural policy instrument choice, have
the Machiavellistic shade of a central, not-so-rational-rule approach. Instead, the
governance of problems will be discussed here from the perspective of democratic
legitimacy. Democracy is not a troublesome normative add-on, but the core of
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practical thinking about intelligent governance. The governance of problems
means optimal use of the intelligence of democracy (Lindblom, 1965, 1990).
From this perspective, it is useful to think of plural ‘democracies of problems’
(Hisschemöller, 1993). The second section will demonstrate selective affinities
between the politics of problem structuring or policy politics and political theories
of democracy. Four different approaches to democratic governance correspond
to the four problem types: technical, market, fairness and participation. In the
third section, this leads to the formulation of a meta-theory of democracy as
a method of decision making on problem structuring and solving that takes
different views on problems into account. Structured problems need a technicaland-market approach, reflected in Schumpeter’s (1942) procedural conception of
democracy. Moderately structured problems with goal consensus need a marketand-participatory approach, consonant with standard liberal, pluralist democratic
theories. Moderately structured problems with means consensus require a
combined fairness-and-technical approach, to be found in accommodationist,
elite-cartel concepts of democracy. Unstructured problems can be tackled
through a fairness-and-participatory approach, best reflected in participatory and
deliberative democratic theories and practices. The intelligence of day-to-day
practice of democratic governance is continuous tinkering or bricolage with these
different and contradictory notions and practices.
Democracy, frame shifts and network management
The role of network management
The conclusion in Chapter Six was that types of policy problems and analytical
and political strategies of problem structuring co-evolve. According to Howlett
(2000: 413, this means that policy makers, next to substantive policy instruments
such as rules (sticks), incentive systems (carrots) and communicative tools
(sermons), have developed a renewed interest in ‘procedural tools designed to
indirectly affect outcomes through the manipulation of policy processes’. Such
network management or subsystem restructuring is done through manipulating
the participation, nodes and links of the networks of policy actors (Kickert et al,
1997). Most authors on network management focus on more or less voluntary,
collaborative governance arrangements crossing levels of government and
transgressing the traditional boundaries between the institutional domains of
public, private and civil society governance. Yet, Howlett correctly points out
that procedural tools do not necessarily serve stakeholder collaboration or enrich
policy-relevant knowledge. They may as well have negative impacts, giving
network management and restructuring at least a shade of ‘Machiavellianism’:
[F]or example, information-based procedural instruments include both
provision of information, as well as its suppression, and the release of
misleading as well as accurate information. Deception, obfuscation, and
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The plural democracies of problems: a meta-theory
other forms of administrative delay, similarly, are all forms of authoritybased procedural instruments. (Howlett, 2000: 419)
On a more benign note, Howlett suggests a relationship between procedural
policy instruments and legitimacy. More specifically, he hypothesises that levels
of policy subsystem de-legitimation affect the extent of subsystem manipulation
appropriate for the task of re-legitimation. If the capacity of governments to use
existing networks for effective policy deliberations is threatened, it may become
imperative to manipulating information production, to recognise new actors as
legitimate ‘players’, to publicly fund interest groups and/or civic organisations
or research institutes, or even to (re)design the institutional rules of the game
themselves.
Howlett’s hypothesis gets support from the cases reported in Chapter Six. The
cases on prenatal screening, Volgermeer pollution and Swiss drugs policy all
showed how central policy makers wielded procedural instruments. They used
information provision, funding and recognition manipulation to nudge older
networks that struggled with loss of output legitimacy into the direction of newer
networks that hopefully would restore governability and legitimacy. Specific types
of new research were ordered and financed; funding and recognition instruments
were used to weaken the position of older, and strengthen the position of new,
actors.They dismantled the older and created new networks of intergovernmental
and inter-institutional governance. The Wadden Sea case involved recognition
manipulation, as a new type of interest group and ecological expertise were
officially given standing at national policy tables. The struggle between the two
opposing institutional designs for accommodation politics were about the (re)
definition of institutional rules of the game.
A democratic deficit in network management?
However enlightening the distinction between substantive and procedural policy
instruments, the ‘Realpolitik’ of network management evokes uneasy questions
about legitimacy and democracy. All forms of policy networks include some and
exclude other actors; and this limited actor pluralism of all modes of governance
may itself spawn conflict over participation in and design of the ‘proper’ democratic
quality of the policy process. In the case of Swiss drugs policy, the new open issue
network, a mix of local administrative and third sector regulation was approvingly
dubbed ‘associative democracy’ by some (Hirst, 1994; Wälti and Kübler, 2003).
Yet, it was criticised as depoliticising the issue by resisting normal democratic
legitimation procedures by others:
[T]he primary concern shared by local activists, social workers, the
police and the medical sector was to achieve grassroots consensus
supporting services and facilities intended for drug addicts, while
attempting (not always successfully) to keep the issue off the
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parliamentary or referendum agenda, where ‘moral’ entrepreneurs can
politicise the issue. (Papadopoulos, 2003: 481)
Generalising the argument from a representative democracy point of view, it could
be claimed that all forms of governance as collaborative policy making have an
inherent democratic deficit. Stakeholders and officials collaborating in policy
networks usually have no formal authority to take decisions.Yet, their influence
over policy options considered feasible and socially acceptable may become very
strong; so strong as to be unchallengeable by elected representatives in Parliaments.
Therefore, some scholars speak of network governance as ‘post-parliamentary
governance ... of organizations, by organizations and for organizations’ (Andersen
and Burns, 1996: 227).The conclusion is that it is imperative to think through the
relationship between cooperative procedures in policy networks and democracy.
Democracies of problems
Hisschemöller (1993) has posited the existence of plural democracies of problems.1
Under the semantic cloak of ‘democracy’, different democratic discourses and
practices are hidden. Democracy is a complex, multifaceted phenomenon, more
aligned to a complex society than is usually assumed. Drawing on standard
political theory accounts of desirable degrees of government intervention and
public participation, it can be shown that the four types of problem/network
configurations have selective affinities with different styles or modes of democracy.
For each type of problem structure, the key question is the amount and scope of
diversity or pluralism needed for responsible problem structuring and problem
solving. Schumpeterian-procedural, liberal-pluralist, elite-cartel accommodationist,
and participatory-cum-deliberative discourses and practices of democracy, allow
for different degrees of pluralism to become effective in policy making. Reallife democracy is a permanent balancing act between these different styles of
democracy, with corresponding impacts on the problem-structuring and problemsolving capacity of political systems.
A technical approach: guardians of the public interest and politically
irrational citizens
Basic theoretical claims
For structured or easily structurable policy problems, problem solving is best dealt
with by handing over responsibility to a small, closed community of scientifically
and professionally trained and qualified policy makers.This is a technical approach to
problem solving; it would be outright technocracy, if not softened by democratic
accountability requirements, which turn it into invited or mandated technocracy.
The first claim of a technical approach is that the political mandate, in a
democracy anchored in the people, is handed over to a select group of specialists
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The plural democracies of problems: a meta-theory
or technocrats. Dahl (1985) calls them ‘guardians’. Guardians are not aristocrats
boasting an ascribed noble heritage, race or gender; they are meritocrats, claiming
their privileged position based on education and training. By their own efforts
they have acquired knowledge and virtues that make them more suitable for
political and administrative leadership than ordinary citizens. In many elitist
theories, guardians are pictured not only as virtuous experts, but also as natural
members of a social vanguard in the progress to modernity.The guardian-vanguard
idea, of course, is epitomised in communist theories about the leading role of the
Communist Party. However, US progressivism is a moderate version of the same
elitist thinking (Fischer, 1990).
The second important claim in a technical approach to problem solving is
that citizens are uninformed, mostly uninterested, and if interested, ruled by
their emotions. Therefore, it would be foolish to let them rule and decide.
Understandably, after the follies of two World Wars, many political theorists around
the 1950s strongly defended this claim on empirical grounds. Most famously,
Joseph Schumpeter (1942: 262) concluded that, in political matters, the typical
citizen drops down to an infantile level of mental performance. Even Robert
Dahl (1963: 59, quoted by Hisschemöller, 1993: 93) wrote that ‘man is not by
instinct a reasonable, reasoning, civic minded being. Many of his most imperious
desires and the source of his most powerful gratification can be traced to ancient
and persistent biological and physiological drives, needs, and wants.’
Martin Lipset (1963), in his book Political man, concluded that in view of most
citizens’ irrationality, political apathy is best for a healthy democracy.
Strict theories of guardianship offer no scope at all for political pluralism.
Every non-guardian is a dangerous dissident; especially former guardians who
set themselves up as new leaders for ‘outsiders’.Theories of irrational citizenship
severely restrict political pluralism. For example, Schumpeter (1942) defines
democracy as no more than a procedure or method for the election of members
of political elites, in principle devoid of any relevance for policy making. The
typical irrational citizen is contrasted to the politician-statesperson.As politicians,
members of political elites should be able to mobilise votes in general elections.
Once elected, they ought to act like statespeople, demonstrating their qualities
as guardians, or trustees, of the public interest; if necessary, against the will of a
majority of citizens. Democracy is a just a method for the peaceful circulation of
elites. It has no function at all in signalling citizens’ policy preferences. At most, it
registers citizens’ diffuse dissatisfaction with the policy performance of a political
elite voted out of power.
Correspondence to democracy in practice
In late 20th and early 21st centuries, the idea of irrational citizenship was
discredited on empirical grounds, at least as an across-the-board model (Carmines
and Huckfeldt, 1996). However, it is still valid for a considerable segment of the
citizenry. Research into styles of citizenship in the Netherlands revealed that up
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to 30% of the voting population could be labelled as ‘outsiders’ (Motivaction,
2001).They are described as disinterested, recalcitrant, passive, inactive and aloof,
with a low degree of social involvement and negative attitudes about obligations
and responsibilities; they distrust government and they are politically cynical
non-voters or protest-voters. As far as lifestyles are concerned, they are found
among ‘modern citizens’ and the ‘comfort oriented’. The former are found to
be conformist, status-sensitive citizens who balance traditional with modernist
values like consume and enjoy. The latter are passive but impulsive consumers,
primarily concerned with a carefree, pleasant and comfortable life. All in all,
these ‘outsiders’ show a strong resemblance to what cultural theorists would call
‘isolates’ or ‘fatalists’, and what political theorists in the 1950s and 1960s would
indeed see as irrational and irresponsible citizens.
In addition to these ‘outsiders’, the same research indicates that the ‘deferential
citizen’ (Almond and Verba, 1963) is not an extinct species. Approximately 18%
of Dutch voters can be labelled as dutiful, obedient citizens. Their attitude to
politics is dependent, obedient to authority, with a need for leadership, but a
huge experienced distance to national government.They are less informed about
politics, and hard to communicate with. They are very locally oriented, and
prepared to get involved only in issues concerning their immediate life world
or environment. These dutiful citizens, or hierarchists in cultural theory terms,
belong to the traditional citizenry, characterised as moralist, duty-bound, statusquo-oriented citizens, keen on keeping traditions and possessions.
Moreover, in policy problems predominantly considered as ‘technical’, the idea
of restricting citizen influence is as seductive as ever. In a technologically advanced
society, most educated and informed citizens consider themselves ‘experts’ in their
own small field of expertise. As such, they claim their own professional discretion;
and they are used to honouring the claims of fellow citizens to their restricted
fields of ‘expertise’.Thus, even modern citizens that may be considered informed
and rational, usually recognise the validity of one-way flows of information and
knowledge, and a ‘give and take’ of professional expertise in their own working
lives. This alone would make them sensitive to political claims that certain issues
– such as occupational health and safety risks, dealing with nuclear power and
nuclear weapons, and so on – have such a high technical component that they
should be delegated to the ‘real’ experts. It is only logical to expect that politicians
be also inclined to give credence to such claims. After all, delegating problemsolving power to professionals and scientists relieves the political agenda. Political
attention to technical issues is restricted to some monitoring – preferably by
trusted peers of the delegated ‘guardians’ – and funding decisions. In certain cases,
technical issues may be struck from the public, political agenda, and transferred
to the private sphere, that is ‘left to’ market forces. However, when persistent and
deeply felt dissent arises on the technical nature of the problem, political pluralism
has been organised out of the political system; possibly to such an extent that a
technical approach clashes with demands of contemporary democracy.
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The plural democracies of problems: a meta-theory
A market approach: a gap between general and individual interests
Basic theoretical claims
Moderately structured problems with considerable normative consensus but
remaining uncertainties about available and relevant knowledge tend to be dealt
with through the problem-solving efforts of temporarily dominating advocacy
coalitions in rather stable policy subsystems. The core idea is that solving the
problem means striking some sort of balance between risks, costs and benefits of
a proposed solution to stakeholders.
This approach to problem structuring and solving may be called a market approach.
Its first claim is that political involvement or engagement by citizens means that
people recognise their personal, individual stakes in a political issue. Citizens are
not infantile or irrational; they are considered quite capable of defining their
own interests in matters of politics and public policy.Their political involvement
increases with the potential stakes of policy decisions for their personal utility. It
is their self-interest that drives citizens to discover consensus; and form collectives
or interest groups.
Thus, this type of reasoning is typical for political theories that conceptualise
political participation as an instrument for the protection of a citizen’s self-interest.
This is as true for Hobbes’ Leviathan, as it is for later classical utilitarian theories.
The political plurality of self-interested citizens is analogous to a market; and by the
same analogy, democracy is a pluralist political process of bargaining about public
policy among minorities, represented in political parties and/or different types of
interest groups.2 This view underlies many pluralist political theories of modern
democracy or polyarchy (Dahl, 2000), from Westminster types with interest group
pluralism to consensus types with interest group corporatism (Lijphart, 1999).
However, interest group theory is not identical to a market approach. After
all, interest groups may be formed on other grounds than just individual utility
maximisation. Exactly this is the vital claim in the strictest formulation of a market
approach, i.e. the calculating citizen in rational choice theory.This theory rejects
the notion that people with a shared interest will spontaneously and voluntarily
unite to defend that interest once they become aware of group consensus. Olson’s
(1965) paradox of collective action is exactly that egoistic individuals will lack
the individual incentives for group formation, because they will prefer a free ride:
they will refuse to contribute to the provision of collective goods as long as they
are uncertain about the contribution of others, and as long as there may be others
who, acting alone or as a small group, have a sufficient interest in providing the
collective good for themselves, irrespective of whether or not others contribute,
and irrespective of their inability to exclude those others from also enjoying the
collective good.
Rational choice theorists see many public choice situations in real-life politics
as analogous to this paradox of collective action.The prisoner’s dilemma and the
‘tragedy of the commons’ are only the most well-known social dilemmas. Rational
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The governance of problems
choice theory thus explains why optimal collective outcomes can only be brought
about through cooperation between plural citizens; but also why there is so often
a gap between the realisation of collective goods or the general interest, and what
actually happens. People have to decide in a situation of social uncertainty about
other people’s choices. Hence, they will decide in favour of their own self-interest,
thereby foregoing the best possible outcome for themselves; but also the worst
possible outcome of being merely exploited by others. Even if individuals for
altruistic reasons would be inclined to bear costs for the provision of a collective
good, they would realise that their contribution would be imperceptible, thus
negligible. This is assumed to be true for many contemporary citizens who, as
part of large, latent groups, do not know each other and do not experience their
mutual interdependence; and thus have no incentive for exemplary moral action
and solidarity.
The consequence is that, one way or another, citizens must be instigated to
socially responsible behaviour. The paradox of the market approach is that a
consistent application of its individualist utility-maximising principles requires
the state as the only plausible source of required external intervention:
As long as individuals are viewed as prisoners, policy prescriptions will
address this metaphor rather than how to enhance the capabilities of
those involved to change the constraining rules of the game to lead to
outcomes other than remorseless tragedies. (Ostrom, 1990: 7)
The problem of governance is to fight free-ridership and design, and apply the
right incentives for citizens to avoid the social dilemma. Such incentives may
include both negative incentives, or penalties based on a legal system; and positive
incentives, or rewards for responsible behaviour, for example where the state
reinforces the outcomes of bargaining and negotiation between citizens and their
interest groups by sharing in the collective costs, or by compensating weaker
parties, through appropriate taxation and regulatory reforms.A strong but minimal
state is compatible with both force and bargaining (Hisschemöller, 1993: 99-102).
The limits of the market approach become visible when pluralism is included
to mean intrinsic values that are non-negotiable.This is not to say that one cannot
jointly deliberate on the relative weight and priority of intrinsic values, like the value
of breathing healthy clean air versus the value of car mobility, giving up smoking
and building new infrastructure or housing. The point is that a market approach
assumes that all values, policy preferences or interests can be bargained about;
and thus, that a party losing out on one value may be compensated by gain on
another value, usually money. In New Public Management lingo, this assumption
is repeated ad nauseam in the injunction to policy makers and stakeholders to
look for win-win situations. In spite of the penetration of economic rationality
in many areas of life, there is not a market for all goods and values.The state itself
cannot be created by market forces. Rules for well-functioning markets (like
property rights, contract obligations and consumer sovereignty) belong to the
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The plural democracies of problems: a meta-theory
class of non-market ‘goods’ themselves. On top of that, there is no consensus on
which values are negotiable or not – that is, there is disagreement on the very
distinction between collective and private goods (Lindblom, 2001: 85-107).
The rational choice theory of collective action underpinning pluralist theories of
politics and democracy is about the provision or protection of collective goods –
not about how to determine what they are. Neither does the theory deal with the
important issue of which collective good to prefer in the case of more than one,
potentially conflicting collective good – like employment and the environment.
The theory assumes consensus on collective goods and their relative priorities
(Olson, 1965: 60); and on that basis, rational choice theory posits the function
of the state as that of manager of the public interest. However, managing based
on consent on involved values is something quite different from constructing
consent in a matter of public choice.The implication for pluralism is that the state
cannot force consensus in cases of new insights regarding collective goods (vide
the Wadden Sea case) or their definition, or serious conflict between different
collective goods. The state cannot assume consensus when a consensus has to be
achieved in the first place.
Correspondence to democracy in practice
A pluralist democracy where calculating citizens influence policy making
through all sorts of interest articulation is nowadays the dominant view among
politicians and policy makers. In 1990, and 2006 as well, more than 70% of Dutch
parliamentarians believed that citizens follow their self-interests rather than the
general interest (Andeweg and Thomassen, 2006: 25-6). The ‘calculating citizen’
has become much more than an ideal-typical construct in numerous government
reports and policy papers. For many public servants it has become the dominant
stereotype for citizen behaviour, informing their way of interacting with citizens
in hearings, in interactive policy making and in street-level contacts.
Yet, research also indicates that properties of the calculating citizen apply to
at most a quarter of the Dutch voters (Motivaction, 2001). Calculating citizens
demonstrate a pragmatist and individualist attitude to politics, typified as informed
but reactive, conformist, materialistic and self-interested; they are engaged, but
at arm’s length, with average social involvement, and have only modest trust
in government. In terms of lifestyles, citizens with attitudes approaching the
calculating citizen type are recruited either from the upwardly mobile (13%),
who are career-oriented individualists, fascinated with status, new technology,
risk and excitement; or from the group of postmodern hedonists (10%), who are
pioneering the experience culture, where experimentation and deliberate breaking
of moral and social conventions have become inherent goals of life.
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A fairness approach: democracy, and the protection of most vulnerable
interests
Basic theoretical claims
Moderately structured problems with deep and persistent value dissent require an
approach to problem structuring and solving that defuses possible intolerance and
doctrinaire stances. Policy deadlock and possible agonistic or even violent political
struggle are to be avoided.Yet, parties to the conflict consider their values nonnegotiable, and their differences of belief as unbridgeable. Only patient discourse
coalition building and accommodation or pacification strategies appear viable
modes of coping with such intransigent political problems.
The fairness or social justice view’s central policy claim is that only the state
can make and enforce policies on politically important, wide-ranging societal
issues deriving from deep-seated, divisive value conflicts. Contrary to the market
approach, which (re)allocates the policy-making task between politics, economics
and civil society, in the fairness approach this is the state’s exclusive burden and
responsibility. Contrary to the guardian approach, the role of the state is not
an implicit justification of the superior qualities or virtues of rulers, but of the
state as social institution. Christensen and Laegreid (2002: 275-6) call this the
institutional state model:
The role of the state is to guarantee the moral and political order, and
citizens have defined rights and obligations that protect the individual
and minorities against the more powerful groups in society.…
Political leaders are obliged to defend general standards of fairness and
reasonableness with reference to what is best for society at large. The
role of politicians is to protect Rechtsstaat values and rules, collective
standards of appropriateness, and justice.
Although the technical and the fairness approach may be simultaneously used
as complementary approaches, they are ultimately very different. The fairness
approach is about public, political choice of values and problems; the technical
approach is about a-political, non-public solutions to an unambiguous technical
problem.
A second claim is that democracy implies value pluralism: not for technical
choice, not for choice for private utility maximisation, but as a political choice
from different, diverging, normatively founded values and goals that will guide
public policy.A third and related claim is that the state needs to construct or create
a sufficiently strong social support basis for its political choice. In guardianship
theories, people will be glad to follow the experts. In the market approach,
citizens and interest groups alone generate consensus, largely based on revealed
preferences; or politicians tactically forge consensus between interest groups. In
the fairness approach, the socially constructed nature of problems is acknowledged;
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The plural democracies of problems: a meta-theory
but citizen voices have to be reflected in the choice of values and in the course
of action for solving problems.
Science plays an important role here, not only in fact-finding and knowledge
production but also in evaluating the quality of policy proposals in light of the
values defining the problem itself. Brecht’s (1959) scientific value alternativism
upholds the fact-value distinction, but claims that science may justifiably inquire
into the precise meaning and consistency of value premises, and into the suitability,
effectiveness, efficiency and side effects of alternative means for goal achievement.
Ezrahi (1990) has pointed out that in doing so, science’s function for politics is to
legitimise and support an objective, neutral and depersonalised form of political
authority.
The market and the fairness approaches (contrary to a participation approach,
to be discussed later) both embrace democracy as rule of law and equality before
the law. The market approach assumes – not realistically, according to many, for
example Lindblom (1977) – that equality exists in the sense of a reasonable
amount of equality in chances, or starting positions. In a fairness approach, this
is not enough; active combat of inequalities is required. Equality is not just a fair
starting position for everyone; fairness is a principle that extends to the race itself,
and, to some extent, even to the results. Lack of equality destroys the feeling of
belonging to and identification with a community, and in that sense is considered
a threat to democracy.
Most characteristic for the fairness approach, however, is not that only the state
can guarantee equality as fairness, but that this has to be done democratically.
The most elaborate underpinning of this core element in a fairness approach is
to be found in the work of political theorist and philosopher John Rawls (1971).
His theory of justice as fairness was taken by many as the best justification of the
post-War welfare states. Rawls sets out to justify a political regime that guarantees
both a maximum of freedom and a maximum of equality. Assuming rational,
moral people who have to choose a political order under conditions of a ‘veil
of ignorance’, that is, without knowing their own social and economic position,
Rawls (1971: 303) formulates as a basic rule for a just political order: ‘All social
primary goods – liberty and opportunity, income and wealth, and the bases for
self-respect – are to be distributed equally unless an unequal distribution of any
or all of these goods is to the advantage of the least favored.’ As future generations
may well belong to the ‘least favored’, the Rawlsian principle includes sustainability
and careful use of non-renewable natural resources as public policy goals.
For a correct understanding of the fairness approach, two more points bear
stressing. For moral people choosing rationally under a veil of ignorance, the idea
of prioritising the most vulnerable interests has in-principle support. However,
Rawls does not conclude that, in a democracy, it is up to fairness guardians to
operationalise and implement this rule. Rather, the in-principle agreement on
the fairness rule is interpreted to mean that most people realise that, in practice,
they cannot combat inequalities on their own. They need a collective entity like
the state to help them do this. In a democracy, the way this is done has to be
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tested and retested.This places upon politicians and policy makers the burden of
creating a sufficiently strong social support basis for policy proposals. They need
to construct the problem as a problem of social justice, and on a case-by-case
basis get people to accept this problem construction.
The second important element is that Rawls posits a lexicographic ordering of
values: freedom first and foremost; equality second, and always more important
than effectiveness, efficiency and contribution to wealth creation. This helps in
comparing inherent, non-negotiable values. Comparing all values on one utility
curve, like in an ideal-typical market approach, is considered politically and
socially unacceptable. The fairness approach, unlike all other approaches, holds
that it is the government’s responsibility to rethink or choose a new or revised
lexicographic ordering of values for society. This is why the fairness approach
appears the most suitable one for moderately structured problems with persistent
dissent on values at stake.
Correspondence to democratic practice
The weakness of the fairness approach is that pragmatic, how-to-go-about-it
issues are left largely untreated. How citizens would have to force governments
to guarantee sufficient equality, and recognise the most vulnerable interests, is not
very clear. Myrdal, Lasswell and many others hoped for a kind of scientifically
guided society (Lindblom, 1990: 213-15), in which the (social) sciences would
be of lasting support to governance actors as a kind of ‘fairness guardian’ under
close democratic surveillance. It is this hope that in many democracies inspired
the build-up of an extensive advisory ‘infrastructure’ around governments (Dror,
1971; see also Wagner, 2001, 2007). The governance actors themselves were
supposed to act as political elites, capable both of morally steering public opinion
in accordance with the fairness principle, and of accommodating or pacifying
moral disagreements about its application among themselves.
Such an accommodationist and pacificatory style of democracy was first
described and analysed by Lijphart (1967) for the Dutch political system in the
early and mid-20th century. He acknowledged that under conditions of strong
value dissensus, in a society fragmented along religious, cultural or ethnic lines,
cooperation among minority groups would have to be very different from the
usual electoral competition between political elites and bargaining among interest
groups in culturally more homogeneous societies. Under such conditions, it would
be wise to abstain from too much electoral competition, and to run the country
as a kind of elite cartel between political elites.Voters would identify only with
their ‘own’ elite; but in elections (under rules of proportional representation)
the relative weight of the different groups and their elites would be accurately
registered. For the rest, between elections, the business of governance would be
left to the accommodationist and pacification practices of elites among each other.
Important among such practices was depoliticising problems and issues. One way
of doing this was through the creation of collegial, independent bodies of a quasi206
The plural democracies of problems: a meta-theory
judicial character like Ombudsman bodies or administrative courts. Such venues
of political influence and participation gave standing to many groups with less,
or less powerful, political resources, and as such, contributed to the idea of justice
as fairness (Christensen and Laegreid, 2002: 285). Another way was by ‘parking’ a
politically hot issue in blue-ribbon advisory commissions of reputable politicians
and academicians. Over the years, and behind closed doors, such commissions
frequently were able to invent acceptable policy discourses about values and goals,
and feasible procedures for dealing with the contingent, sometimes case-by-case,
treatment of problems, usually under the guise of professional expertise. Under
conditions of divisive value dissent, cultural fragmentation and threat of social
intolerance and discrimination, some loss of democratic quality of governance is
inevitable. However, the price paid is worth it because of the maintenance of a
plurality of opinions and beliefs (to the extent of representation by political elites),
the maintenance of the rule of law and avoidance of potentially violent conflicts.
It is clear that in neo-liberal, individualising and de-ideologising times,
conditions for an accommodationist-democratic approach are less favourable.
For a fairness approach to problem structuring and solving to be successful,
citizens need to be deferential, resigned, but trusting in government and science.
Citizens generally became less deferential, and thus less tolerant of being treated
as mere laypersons in a science communication or public relations show; or
less willing to be mere followers of one political elite. Moreover, it is exactly
the seemingly boundless expansion of the welfare state and the more frequent,
disappointing encounters between its bureaucracy and citizens, that have sparked
the dependence-cum-distrust syndrome that was to undermine the belief in state
intervention of the last decades.
A participation approach: deliberation as maximising equality and pluralism
Basic theoretical claims
At first sight, unstructured, messy or wicked problems are beyond structuring, let
alone solving. They are left to social opinion formation, media or news industry
hypes and cascading opinions, and Schattschneiderian political power tactics of
socialising or privatising problems. There is a ‘primeval soup’ (Kingdon, 1984)
of political and social efforts to mobilise support around issues and move them
on and higher up the public and political agenda, or deny them agenda status.
Dominant problem frames, like a ‘deus ex machina’, are supposed to emerge
through chaotic and not well-understood variety-and-selection learning processes.
Dominant problem frames resulting from such random political processes are
supposed to offer politicians and policy makers handles for processing them into
attractive policies. The question, then, is: to what extent is it possible to enrich
the ‘powering’ of usual agonistic agenda politics (of beating unstructured problems
into the one-and-only favoured frame) with more ‘probing’ (Lindblom, 1990), or
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better deliberation about possible problem framings before making a political
choice among them?
Since the deliberative turn in democratic theory in the 1990s, many have
endorsed the idea of more citizen engagement and participation not as a
substitute, but as a complement to representative democracy. Proposals for putting
more deliberation into normal democracy are many (about which later in this
chapter), but its most important rationale is that participation beyond the pale of
‘usual suspects’ in a representative democracy increases decision quality through
maximising pluralism. In other words, broader participation makes citizens not
only more equal, it also mobilises their plural views, and thereby the collective
intelligence of democracy (Lindblom, 1965).
Contrary to the market approach, where political participation is in the service
of individual rationality as private utility maximisation, here participation is in
the service of social rationality, what a person thinks is best for society and their
fellow citizens. Moreover, in the mutual exchange of opinions and during debate,
citizens discover, develop and refine ideas about their own goals and interests.
Deliberation and interaction not only serve the expression of individual opinions
and volitions; they also change them. Political participation is supposed to generate
learning processes through which individuals become (more) aware of each
other’s problems. Sometimes this entails new insights in one’s own position and
preferences in social and political life.
In the market approach, the social contract justifies state force and citizen
obedience in the citizens’ individual interest. In the participation approach, the
social contract is an obligation, not to the state but to one’s fellow citizens. It is
a promise of people to cooperate to mutual benefit: ‘A promise is based on trust,
keeping faith and responsibility, not the “natural morality” of possessive individuals,
which is why it is promising, not contract, that is fundamental to social life itself ’
(Pateman, 1979: 170).
Therefore, according to these participation and social rationality theories, the
state and its bureaucracy produce apathy and alienation. Gradually, the (welfare)
state strips individuals of their personal responsibility towards themselves and the
larger community. Whereas the market approach blames the state for destroying
individualism and entrepreneurship, deliberationists blame the state for destroying
social cohesion as manifested in family life, community life, social discipline, social
obligations and responsibilities. Hence, there can be a strong communitarian
element in the participation approach. After all, small-sized communities permit
the face-to-face communication and deliberation required for participatory
government and politics. Decentralising state powers and authority to local or
community government levels is a favourite and readily available policy instrument.
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The plural democracies of problems: a meta-theory
Correspondence to democracy in practice
The claim that participation leads to more deliberation, and hence strengthens the
intelligence of democracy, requires two complementary claims. First, people can
judge rationally for themselves in issues they are involved or have a stake in. Second,
people can let their judgement be guided by an awareness of social responsibility,
not just self-interest.The former claim can hardly be said to be exclusive any more
for a participatory democratic stance. Most voter studies now accept that ordinary
citizens, while naturally concerned about containing the costs of acquiring and
processing political information, are quite capable of acting purposefully based
on available knowledge (Carmines and Huckfeldt, 1996: 248-50; Sniderman et
al, 1991).The latter claim amounts to the denial of the major rationale for liberal
democracy, namely the omnipresence of social dilemmas between egoistic and
altruistic conduct, or self-interest- and general-interest-oriented behaviour. Yet,
there exists considerable evidence for the contrary claim, both from field studies
and controlled experiments in ‘give’-problems of public goods and ‘take’-problems
of common pool resources. The findings for common resource pool problems
were summarised as:
[A] substantial number, but not all, of the individuals in these carefully
controlled experiments are trustworthy and reciprocate trust if it has
been extended. When behavior is discovered that is not consistent
with reciprocity, individuals are willing to use retribution in a
variety of forms. Individuals also rely on a battery of heuristics in
response to complexity. Without communication and agreements on
joint strategies, these heuristics lead to overuse. On the other hand,
individuals are willing to discuss ways to increase their own and
others’ payoffs in a sequence of rounds. Many are willing to make
contingent promises when others are assessed as trustworthy.… These
conclusions are not consistent with predictions derived from classical
game-theoretic models of participants focusing entirely on monetary
returns in these situations.They are, however, consistent with evidence
gathered from empirical research in the field. (Ostrom, 2005: 98)
These findings demonstrate the existence of situations where actors do not
experience a dilemma between self-interest and a common, shared interest.
They choose both rationally, and in a socially responsible way. It shows that
a participatory-cum-deliberative approach to problem structuring and solving
is a realistic option under certain conditions. Especially if opportunities for
communication and deliberation are lacking, or if strong time pressure exists,
feelings of social insecurity and uncertainty about others’ behavioural strategies
may bring people to resort to other, more self-directed strategies.
For adherents of participatory-cum-deliberative democracy it is therefore
seductive to give in to the communitarian streak in their theories. More close-knit
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The governance of problems
communities may strengthen feelings of social security and eliminate uncertainty
about others’ behaviour. 3 relocated endnote!Yet, this may easily lead to an overidealisation of smaller communities as socially integrated and harmonious. Apart
from possibly oppressing dissenting individuals, an alleged homogeneity or unity
of opinion and belief in the community (Etzioni, 1996) runs counter to the
primary goal of a participatory approach as maximising diversity or pluralism as
a condition for high-quality collective decisions.
Another constraint on a participatory-cum-deliberative approach is that one
cannot force people to participate. They may refuse to participate if they feel
powerless, or not involved and not responsible, or totally lacking in knowledge
about a public issue. Neither will deliberation and learning happen, if you
force knowledgeable people to get involved and ‘participate’. In an age of
individualisation and de-ideologisation, the participatory attitude is undermined:
A common interest is not necessarily assumed to exist, so why participate?; We
dislike people speaking on behalf of others, or ourselves speaking on behalf
of others, so what about social responsibility for each others’ well-being? Let
everybody speak for himself!
It is clear that for a participatory approach to problem structuring and solving to
be successful, citizens need to feel socially and politically engaged and responsible.
Their attitude to government and politics ought to be active, willing to participate
and interact with politicians and government officials.They should be politically
interested and, unlike pragmatist individualists, general-interest oriented. They
should believe in well-functioning democracy and trust government, but in a
critical and involved way.
Citizenship-style research estimates the category of such ‘reliable’ citizens at
approximately 30% (Motivaction, 2001). In terms of lifestyles, they are to be found
in roughly equal proportions among three categories of citizens:
• the new conservatives – liberal-conservative social upper-class, keen on
technological innovation but resisting cultural and social innovation;
• cosmopolitans – open and critical citizens of the planet who integrate
postmodern values such as self-development with modern values such as
success, materialism and enjoying life;
• postmaterialists avant la lettre – idealists, critical about society, desiring selfdevelopment, supporting environmental goals, and actively opposing social
injustice.
However, only the postmaterialists are true egalitarians and are fully supportive of
a participatory approach. Given the relatively strong support for less dependence
of government among new conservatives and cosmopolitans (Motivaction, 2001),
there is an undercurrent among the majority of active and responsible citizens that
is as likely to be individualist as communitarian. In both cases, the justification of
the primacy of government has been eroded by doubt, alleged failure, and lack
of self-confidence. This is equally true for the deliberationist belief in politics as
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The plural democracies of problems: a meta-theory
the main mechanism through which moral dialogues among responsible citizens
results in wise decisions. In conclusion, one may observe that even among active
and trustful citizens as in principle sympathetic to a fairness or a participatory
approach, active support is probably ambiguous and ambivalent.
A meta-theory of democratic practices
To what extent do the four ideal-typical approaches to problem structuring
correspond to important arguments in political, especially democracy, theory?
The conclusions underline the lasting importance of rejoining the separate fields
of policy and political science in what Lasswell called the policy sciences of
democracy (Lerner and Lasswell, 1951; more recently Dryzek, 1990; and Schneider
and Ingram, 1997). Jointly, the conclusions may be stated as a meta-theory about
the intelligence of democracy in the governance of problems (see Figure 8.1).
Figure 8.1: Problem types, political theories and types of democracy
Government intervention
high
low
FAIRNESS
UP
MSPg
Accommodationist,
elite-cartel democracy
Schumpeterian,
procedural democracy
SP
MSPm
high
low
Agreement on values-at-stake
Participation
Liberal,
pluralist democracy
TECHNICAL
Deliberative,
participatory democracy
high
PARTICIPATORY
Certainty of knowledge
low
MARKET
low
high
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The governance of problems
The point of departure was the typology of problem types, along the axes of (un)
certainty on knowledge and (dis)agreement on values.The problem types appear to
correspond to types of political arguments, along the axes of degree of government
intervention (high: fairness; low: market) and degree of participation (high:
participatory; low: technical). Thus, political discourse on structured problems
(SP) is characterised by strong influences from both a technical and a market
approach; on moderately structured problems with considerable goal agreement
(MSPg), by a combination of arguments from a market and participatory approach;
on moderately structured problems with considerable agreement on knowledge
(MSPm), by a coalescence of the fairness and technical approach; and, finally,
on unstructured problems (UP), by a synthesis of the participatory and fairness
approach. Summarising, the four problem types correspond fairly well to standard
distinctions in political theory on desirable degrees of government intervention
and participation.
This convergence between policy and political approaches also extends to
concepts of democracy. The rule approach to structured problems is compatible
with a thin procedural interpretation of democracy as a mechanism for the peaceful
circulation of elites under restricted popular influence.The negotiation-and-search
approach to moderately structured problems with goal consensus is compatible
with standard accounts of liberal, pluralist democracy, either in interest group
theory or corporatist variations. The accommodation approach to moderately
structured problems with knowledge certainty appeals to an elite-cartel democracy.
The learning approach to unstructured problems calls for participatory-cumdeliberative modes of democracy.
There is no dearth of studies that spell out the contradictions between different
modes of democracy. Such analyses usually discuss abstract criteria of input,
throughput and output or outcome legitimacy for democratic decision making.
Most of such analyses and assessments conclude that in practice these criteria
conflict or rule each other out.The choice for a type of democratic method is thus
constructed as dependent on the weight given to the different types of criteria.
What is too easily overlooked in such theoretical exercises is that ‘democracy’, in
political practice, is not a unified concept. In everyday political and administrative
practice, ‘democracy’ is bricolage or tinkering with different and contradictory
democratic notions and practices.
Not abstract legitimacy criteria, but the potential contribution to successful
coping with social and political issues through politics and government, has been
chosen in this study as the major legitimate goal of democratic decision making.
Therefore, the connections of political and democracy theory to types of problems
were discussed. From this perspective, it may be observed that the four different
concepts of democracy, not separately but jointly, constitute an adequate description
of the working of democracy in practice. Together they comprise inherently
conflicting but constituent parts of the set of beliefs, rules and procedures that,
with different degrees of success, are applied to the democratic governance of
different types of policy problems. Depending on one’s political judgement on
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The plural democracies of problems: a meta-theory
a problematic situation, ‘democracy’ sometimes means simple majority decisions
and mandated technocracy, sometimes stakeholder consultation, bargaining
processes and applied research in stable policy networks, sometimes pacifying
contradictory views, and in yet other times organising citizen participation in
society-wide debates.
In other words, from the perspective of democratic governance as a contribution
to problem structuring and solving, there exists an overarching norm that catches
the different concepts of democracy in a meta-theory.That norm is expressed in
the claim that different modes of democracy are justified on the basis of different
insights about the nature of public problems and issues. What distinguishes
democracy from all other types of politics is its respect for the dialogical character
of human beings; hence, its willingness to foster the questioning of power by
citizens and its suitability to allow the expression of dissenting views and voices
in political decision making. Different types of public problems need expression
of different, conflicting views in different degrees. On this basis, rule is justified as
long as people agree on the technical nature of an issue; negotiation of interests
is justified if people agree on the scope and nature of policy goals, or collective
goods, or common pool resources; accommodation and pacification are justified
when opposing parties, locked in sharp value conflict, threaten to exclude each
other from meaningful political participation; and, finally, learning is justified as
a strategy of democratic inquiry into the best ways of structuring unstructured
problems. After all, authentic self-reflexivity and well-reasoned deliberation
among involved stakeholders and citizens is the only way to do full justice to
the socially and politically constructed nature of problems. It is in this sense that
claims presented here jointly constitute a meta-theory about the maximisation
of the intelligence of democracy in the governance of problems.
Notes
The following sections are a digest of ideas and arguments much more fully elaborated
in Hisschemöller’s (1993) dissertation. For a much briefer version, focusing on the role of
citizens in responding to science and technology, see Hisschemöller and Midden (1999).
1
Compared to a Schumpeterian democracy, the market analogy is broadened from
choosing among political leaders to bargaining about public policies.
2
Other experiments have confirmed the Greed–Efficiency–Fairness (GEF) hypothesis by
Wilke – that under conditions of deliberation and constrained social uncertainty, greed is
considerably inhibited by considerations of efficiency and fairness (Eek and Biel, 2003).
3
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Public engagement and
deliberative designs
Given its essentially intersubjective and dialectical character, political
discourse and conduct are fundamentally to be measured … against
the standard of whether they acknowledge and sustain the interrogative
dialectic. Only an unremitting interrogative dialectic allows men, if
not to achieve fixed truths, at least to slough off errors. (Dauenhauer,
1986: 34)
Introduction
Applied to political regimes or systems as a whole, the meta-theory of plural
democracies of problems has strong normative and prescriptive implications. Any
policy-making system ought to be sufficiently robust and flexible to encompass
in its political repertoire all four problem-structuring approaches, types of policy
networks, styles of doable policy analysis, and democracy types.To the extent they
have, moreover, they also ought to be able to rebalance the weight of these four
modes in accordance with the development of dominant problem framings.That
is, governance systems ought to be capable of flexible shifts from rule and analysis/
instruction learning, to negotiation, to accommodation and conflict management,
to participatory and deliberative variety/selection learning. However, liberal
democracies cannot handle all four different problem types equally well. In this
chapter, the first section shows that especially unstructured problems tend to be
neglected or approached the wrong way.The second section discusses whether and
to what extent this type of democratic deficit may be remedied by gently nudging
the political system and policy network to more deliberation-cum-participation by
meta-governance or deliberate shifts in governance. Particularly, the third section
discusses common problems in running deliberative-democratic experiments and
the uptake of their outputs in normal, representative-democratic politics.
Wrong-problem problems
Type III errors
It was claimed in Chapter Eight that the meta-theory of democratic practice is
descriptively adequate for democratic problem structuring and solving in many
Western democracies. Nevertheless, this does not diminish its possibilities as a
tool for assessment and potential improvements.This possibility is given with the
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The governance of problems
concept of Type III errors, or wrong-problem problems (a concept introduced
in Chapter Three), as structural or temporal mismatches between the effectively
dominant governmental problem definition and alternative problem framings alive
among other groups of citizens or stakeholders in society. In light of the previous
discussion, such a mismatch may also be considered as allowing too little, or (in
theory) too much, pluralism for successful problem coping.
The trouble with liberal democracies is that they are more solution than
problem oriented.They are good at rapidly institutionalising sometimes complex
routine issues in (quasi)professional networks that develop standards and systems
of regulation and quality assessment. They are also good at institutionalising
frequently recurring processes of interest articulation and aggregation in policy
networks for negotiation. They even have available strategies for dealing with
value conflicts like shifting the ethical burden to the legal system, or ethical
commissions, or even, paradoxically, science. However, these readily available
political institutions require for their effective functioning far-reaching degrees of
problem structuring.Yet, liberal representative democracies turn over unstructured
or wicked problems to unpredictable, chaotic and anarchistic processes of mass
communication and opinion formation in a weakened civil society and a
commercialised media system. For political parties and other traditional political
channels of influencing public opinion, political agenda-building processes under
current conditions of distrust of representation and authority are uncontrollable
and erratic. Although traditional political intermediaries try hard to keep up with
the new information technologies and the internet and use them as sources of
information and influence, they appear to be marginalised more and more. At
least, the traditional political intermediaries are no longer capable of providing
citizens with the information and ideas that inspire citizens to positively identify
with political parties, their platforms or other symbols capable of mobilising
collective action based on shared systems of meaning and belief.1
Especially regarding unstructured or wicked problems, increasing in number
and urgency in a risk society inhabited by monitorial citizens,2 there is a need for
more public spaces for somewhat more disciplined deliberation and serious debate.
In such public spaces, traditional assumptions of representation and authority are
bracketed. Deliberation between citizens should temporarily be freed from the
socio-political constructions of a ‘we-the-people’ or ‘we-the-community’ (Catlaw,
2006). One should allow problematic situations to be radically deconstructed, as
a starting point for developing new, potentially innovative, shared and collective
meanings.
In solution-oriented democracy, citizens have insufficient incentives and spaces
for this kind of collective exchange of views on societal problems. Citizens
with diverging insights, experiences and interests are discouraged rather than
encouraged to deliberate about their views. Political participation is allowed in
the choice among a politically limited set of alternatives for problem solutions.
However, the problem itself has been defined already, and policy-making officials
and other experts fix the alternatives. Participation only serves the goal of
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Public engagement and deliberative designs
determining who will be winners and losers. This is true for almost any form of
current political participation, from varying procedures for hearings or voice, to
referendums. The key question therefore appears to be: how to achieve a more
problem-oriented democratic political practice? The problem may be illustrated
by the situation in Dutch healthcare (Hoppe, 2008a).
Towards of primacy of problems in healthcare?
Have your own biological child, even though you are an infertile couple, or single
parent. Bear your child irrespective of age. No more premature deaths due to
shortages in donor organs. Celebrate your 100th anniversary in good health and
excellent spirits. These are just some of the promises offered by innovations in
medical science and technology. Biomedical technology, genetics, genomics, nanoand neuroscience will continue to generate wide-ranging medical-technological
innovations. Because they are so tangible for most men and women as (potential)
parents, this is especially true for technologies in human reproduction (Kirejzcyk
et al, 2001), prenatal diagnostics and predictive medicine. Pre-implantation
genetic diagnostics, therapeutic cloning (Swierstra, 2000) and preventive embryo
selection are good examples. Figure 9.1 gives an overview of types of problems
normally addressed in the healthcare policy network, with technologically not
fully matured and ethically contested medical technologies as a growing segment
of unstructured problems.
–
Figure 9.1: Problem types in healthcare
Variety-selection learning or chaos
(garbage cans)
Moderately structured (consent on
goals) problems:
Negotiation, problem-driven research
Postmenopausal pregnancy,
xenotransplantation, therapeutic
cloning
Required care; hospital budgets;
fighting obesity
Moderately structured (consent on
means) problems:
Structured problems:
Accommodation, conflict management
Abortion; euthanasia; preventive
embryo selection
Rule, analysis-instruction learning
Prenatal screening for
all pregnant women
+
CERTAINTY ABOUT KNOWLEDGE
Unstructured problems:
–
CONSENT ON NORMS AND VALUES
+
Source: Hoppe (2008a: 297)
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The governance of problems
In the Netherlands, the big issue facing players in the health policy subsystem
for quite some time to come is whether or not, and to what extent, novel medical
treatments using innovative but ethically contestable technologies ought to be
included in the set of treatments routinely applied in clinics and reimbursed to
patients with healthcare cost insurance, but partly also from the government budget.
So far, government and health insurance companies rely on a system of provision
on medical indication. Decision making seeks consent on the cost-effectiveness
of the technology and derived treatment methods. This is the task of a rather
closed, corporatist policy subsystem of stakeholders and medical professionals. On
the one hand, there are the medical professional groups, like specialists, general
practitioners, medical researchers, the many types of paramedical professionals, the
pharmaceutical and biotechnology researchers and engineers in their industrial
laboratory complexes.Their views count especially to establish sufficient certainty
on the laboratory, clinical and real-life effectiveness of standardised treatments.
On the other hand, there are stakeholders, like health insurance companies,
hospital and other healthcare institution managers, representatives of the medicalpharmaceutical-biotechnological commercial complex, trade unions of healthcare
workers and patient organisations.They are supposed to discuss matters of resource
efficiency, implementation feasibility, patient acceptability and so on.
In fact, the policy-making system is a hybrid between professional self-regulation
and corporatist interest articulation. The historical core of the system is shaped
by defining the problem of medical technology and its impact on health policy
as a moderately structured problem with knowledge certainty. Peer review took
care of the knowledge dimension; the ethical dimension was left to politics.
Politicians would have the role of linespeople: doctors should not mix up medical
treatment with implicit, but constraining conditions that implicitly or explicitly
reflect religious, ethical and political judgements on ‘good parenting’, or on the
role of medical technology in a ‘good society’.
Once new technologies were admitted, the system shifted to a rule-mode fit
for structured problems, where everything was left to the medical profession.
Owing to strong consensus on the goals for health policy – equal access to equal
treatment for all Dutch citizens at reasonable costs – the health sector was allowed
to grow and grow, seemingly under professional self-regulation. However, the
ever-increasing macro-economic importance of health-related technological,
industrial and service activities gradually led to more deliberate efforts at cost
control. In essence, this took the shape of bargaining about healthcare costs in an
‘iron triangle’ between medical professionals, insurance companies and the state.
In the 1980s and 1990s, politicians facilitated the interests of patient groups
as a kind of countervailing public power to curb the interests of the medical
professionals. It is a clear case of policy subsystem restructuring. Politicians feared
that the existing ‘iron triangle’ network, without a representative voice for the
patient’s perspective, threatened effective policy deliberation and the legitimacy of
decisions on far-reaching reforms for managed competition in healthcare. In order
to widen the deliberative capacity and save the legitimacy of political decision
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Public engagement and deliberative designs
making, they recognised patient groups as legitimate ‘players’; and used public
funding of patient interest groups and organisations to expand the composition
of the network. Hence, the problem definition shifted to moderately structured
problems with considerable goal consent; and the policy subsystem acquired
the corresponding traits of a neo-corporatist subsystem for stakeholder interest
articulation – as an overlay on top, not as a substitute for the older institutional
arrangements.
Moreover, next to the transition to managed competition, this hybrid, opaque
and difficult-to-steer policy subsystem is also challenged by ethically contested
new medical technologies. These innovations breed unstructured problems
because frequently neither their cost-effectiveness nor their ethical dimensions
have crystallised into clear, publicly defensible, and dominant policy views or
beliefs. The contemporary policy system evolved from efforts to cope with
both forms of moderately structured and fully structured problems. Yet, now it
appears to have serious difficulties in dealing with the new type of unstructured
problems. Thus, one may speak of a potential structural mismatch: a policy
network, designed to cope with structured and moderately structured problems,
is now ‘bombarded’ with ‘unprocessable’ unstructured problems because of rapid
technological developments. The system was capable of relatively harmonious
‘gear shifts’ between accommodation, negotiation and rule as modes of problem
coping. However, in spite of the presence of patient organisations and forums
as a too modest shift to a more pluralist, participatory and deliberative style of
policy making, the system shows strains to add a learning style of coping with
unstructured problems to its repertoire.
In healthcare, the social, legal and ethical aspects of medical-technological
innovations ought to be as intelligently and seriously debated as the more common
scientific, technical and economic aspects. Based on the principle of the primacy
or good governance of policy problems, the health policy system ought to be
sufficiently robust and flexible to accommodate all policy-making styles for all
types of problems.This is clearly not yet the case.What would be necessary, then,
is to find institutional resources to inject more pluralism in more seriously and
creatively dealing with unstructured problems through more public spaces for
participation, deliberation and learning. How is this to be achieved?
The short answer to this question is: by gently nudging the policy politics of
the health policy network to more deliberation and/or participation through
meta-governance. As explained in Chapter Six, meta-governance constitutes the
endeavour by politicians, policy intellectuals or some other policy entrepreneurs to
influence the discourse, composition and participation modes of players, the rules
of the game and the interdependencies between players in governance networks
(Sørensen and Torfing, 2005: 202-5). Frankly speaking, it would be difficult to
draw the line between meta-governance and political tinkering or bricolage. The
health system is simply too complex and self-controlled to be amenable to metagovernance as top-down steering from a central control unit. The only way to
‘steer’ such complex systems is by using the forces and drivers already effective in
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The governance of problems
it; to ‘interpolate’ small doses of change in such ways that the balance of forces is
changed in the desired direction (Dunsire, 1986; Hood, 1986). One would have
to fine-tune the relative weight of the different, partially opposing governance
modes present in the overall constellation.
In healthcare, some developments are going in this direction already. Under
managed competition, the role of (potential) patients as clients will gain in weight
and influence in policy implementation as health service delivery. Patient selfmanagement, case management, more choice in health service delivery, patient
and user rankings of health service organisations – they will all become more
important. Yet, bolder steps are required in dealing prudently with ethically
contestable medical innovation. Under present conditions, patient organisations
and platforms function as interest groups. Valuable as this may be, they have
become part of the ‘usual suspects’. The voices (in the plural) of ordinary people
and citizens as potential patients, and as relatives, friends or caretakers of patients,
are only faintly audible through the normal modes of political participation in
representative democracy. To really inject more pluralism into creatively dealing
with and collective learning about unstructured problems of medical-technological
innovations, introducing more participatory and deliberative design elements in
health technology assessments would be a good start.
Shifts in governance: meta-governance
Interpolable balancing as a quest for institutional alignments
Most policy domains are embedded in and constituted by multiple institutional
orders. Healthcare is a telling example. If you get ill, you invoke the very different
principles of multiple institutional orders to be cured. You rely partly on the
spontaneous social solidarity of the household and civil society, that is, you count
on your spouse, family, neighbours and friends to care for you. If your illness is
bad enough, you invoke the expertise of medical doctors as members of their
professional and scientific communities. If you need medicine or hospitalisation,
the quid-pro-quo rules (prices) of health insurance companies, hospitals and the
pharmaceutical corporations get you what you need. If this becomes too costly
for an individual patient, many states have established compulsory health insurance
systems, which somehow mix rules of solidarity and quid-pro-quo to guarantee
equal access against acceptable costs to most citizens.This simple example of being
ill and getting better shows that thinking in terms of separate institutional logics
does not bring you far. Market interactions alone, or family care alone, or state
authority alone, cannot cure you. It is not the institutions in isolation that matter
to you as a patient; it is the institutional configuration or ensemble that matters.
This is equally true for policy analysts designing, for example, healthcare policy.
In Chapter One, governance was defined as efforts to align or bring about
concerted action across multiple modes of social coordination for public purpose.
Interpolable balancing is the ongoing quest for new institutional alignments.
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Accounts of policy change in grid-group cultural theory and institutionalist
theory argue the same.
In cultural theory, it is stressed that the four cultural biases and corresponding
institutional arrangements run into the limits of their own monistic logics, unless
productive hybridity is established by means of apparently ‘clumsy’ institutions.
This is called the requisite variety condition:‘each way of life, though it competes
with the rest, ultimately needs them’ (Thompson et al, 1990: 86). The freedom
to contract in the market system can only be upheld through hierarchic state
authority by way of rules and penalties applied by the judiciary.The solidarity of
egalitarian groups needs correction by market-type efficiency tests. And so on.
Applied to policy analysis, cultural theory supports interpolable balancing as social
and policy-oriented learning. It offers easily applicable heuristics for anticipating
side effects of too-dominant institutional logics, for finding overlooked options
and for constructing productive culturally hybrid policy alternatives in policy
brokerage and design (Hoppe, 2007: 295-8).
In institutionalist approaches, interpolable balancing is depicted as a quest for
complementarity and hierarchy (Helderman, 2007: 98-121). Complementarity is
a situation in which a particular institution works better because of the presence
of some other forms of institution or organisation. For example, it may be argued
that healthcare provision by professional medical associations works better because
the state bureaucracy attributes monopoly competencies to, but also regulates,
these professional communities; and because, through income redistribution
and compulsory healthcare insurance, it regulates demand for healthcare. State
hierarchy and professional association are symmetrical, complementary institutions,
which co-produce a beneficial social effect.
Hierarchy means a situation in which one institutional order imposes its
logic on the entire institutional configuration; one institution is dominating
and constraining the functioning of alternative institutional orders, at least
during a particular point or period in time. For example, by adding market-type
incentives into a healthcare system characterised until the 1990s by supposedly
complementary relations between bureaucratism and professionalism, many fear
that in future the market will drive out professionalism. After all, the absolute
quality standards adhered to by dedicated professionals will be subjected to the
relative tests of price/quality standards dominating the market system. Hence, the
market system will become hierarchic in healthcare.
Both in cultural theory and in institutionalist accounts, interpolable balancing is
a never-ending activity because institutional ensembles are in a state of permanent
dynamic imbalance. This may not be true for democratic political systems as a
whole. Political and policy players will not (normally) waste their time discussing
the constitution or other historically rooted and socio-politically well-embedded
democratic governance practices. Nevertheless, in policy domains and networks
policy players are keen on detecting strategic opportunities to advance the
influence of their favourite institutions. In that precise sense, institutions need
continuous maintenance, are never finished and are always in need of reform
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The governance of problems
(Dauenhauer, 1986:138). Shifts in the power balance of institutional orders directly
influence stakeholders’ resources, roles, responsibilities and tasks. Therefore, they
will stand ready to form alliances with adherents of complementary institutions
when it seems advantageous for furthering their own cause; and sever such alliances
when they become disadvantageous. In the context of constantly changing
opportunities and constraints, interpolable balancing takes shape as a gradual
transformation of policies and institutional orders.
Following Streeck and Thelen (2005), there appear to exist some recognisable
patterns of institutional transformation, depending on the relative strength
of internal and external barriers to change: drift, conversion, layering and
displacement/exhaustion (see Figure 9.2).
Figure 9.2: Four types of gradual institutional transformation
Barriers to internal change
Status-quo bias of political environment
High
High
Low
Low
Drift
Conversion
Transformation of stable institutions
due to changing circumstances
Internal adaptations of existing
institutions
Layering
Displacement/exhaustion
Creation of new institutions without
the elimination of old ones
Transformation of stable institutions
due to changing
Source: Helderman (2007: 118)
Interpolable balancing as meta-governance would have to avoid the high-high and
the low-low cells. Drift represents institutional transformation due to changing
external conditions – either nature-made catastrophes or man-made crises – in
the face of headstrong and persistent internal and external opposition to change.
These deadlocked situations lead to uncontrollable changes in existing institutions.
Sometimes they can turn into runaway institutional destruction through
displacement and exhaustion. As meta-governance, interpolable balancing would
rather aim at the layering and conversion types of institutional transformation. In
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Public engagement and deliberative designs
cases of layering, new institutions are added to the older ones and they may grow in
importance over time. In the healthcare system example, market-type institutional
elements were introduced in a system governed so far by professionalism and
buraucratism. Especially in such transformations, the notion of alignment and
complementarity is essential. In the case of healthcare, the argument is that markettype incentives are needed to counteract both the tendencies of professionalism
to infinite expansion, and the bureaucratic tendency for imposed inflexibility. In
the case of conversion, institutions are adapted to serve the new goals and fit the
interests of new policy players admitted to the policy network.
Nudging present systems of network governance to facilitate the structuring of
unstructured or wicked problems, and to structurally accommodate the input of
larger numbers of citizen, would appear to require exactly institutional changes
in the sense of layering and conversion. They would require adding elements
of deliberative and participatory democracy to the institutional repertoire, or
changing existing non-deliberative democratic institutions into more deliberative
directions.
Constraints on pluralism
However, first it makes sense to ask: what stands in the way of such institutional
transformations? What, then, would be the constraints for more democratic
pluralism and deliberation in our governance systems? Three come to mind
immediately: network governance, the revival of the primacy of politics, and
New Public Management.
Instead of constructing network governance as merely undermining
representative democracy (Papadopoulos, 2003), some consider it a cradle of
new forms of democracy. If most affected parties to a public problem join the
network, the scope for discursive contestation is widened, because intermediate
levels of sub-elites are mobilised. Vertically, they link central steering through
representative democracy to forms of self-governing in communities and civil
society associations. Horizontally, they link different policy or territorial (regional,
local and neighbourhood) communities (Sørensen and Torfing, 2005: 200). In
network governance, the trend is towards non-hierarchical, non-bureaucratic,
cultural (Bang, 2004) or holistic governance (6 et al, 2002). Yet, one may be
justifiably suspicious about the authentic quality of increasing public engagement
with governance in these ways. Network governance, rather, uses backward
mapping techniques (Elmore, 1985) and ‘soft’, communicative policy instruments
to nourish the proper governmentality among target populations in order to keep
the system running smoothly:
[W]hen leaders and managers today increasingly choose to connect
and empower, … it is because they have come to recognize that in an
increasingly ‘glocalized’ (global and local) world in which governing
failure is inevitable, one must pay explicit attention to how to use
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The governance of problems
ethical-political communication strategically for involving civil society
and citizens in governing systems... Their survival and development
rely increasingly on their abilities to empower lay people and to
affect their identities in such a way that they act effectively and
self-responsibly and for the sake of the effectiveness, coherence and
integration as a whole….’ (Bang, 2004: 165-6)
Bang (2004: 186) justifiably warns that cultural or holistic governance may
well develop into a ‘pervasive form of systems colonizing of the life world’. If
politicians and administrators show the self-restraint and self-discipline expected
from democrats, these fears do not necessarily materialise. However, it requires
them to actually step outside their traditional roles of leader, man-of-reason and
expert. Instead, they would have to take on roles like facilitator, counsellor or
midwife (Catlaw, 2006). This might especially be true when formal changes of
representative democracy like people’s initiatives in parliamentary agenda setting
and corrective referendums were to be put in place. Although most formal changes
in democratic rule are probably ineffective, these ones will probably foster more
citizen-regarding policy making as political leaders will ‘govern under the shadow
of the referendum’:
[T]he optional referendum hangs like a sword of Damocles over the
whole legislative process, potentially ruining entire bills. Consequently,
institutional mechanisms have developed … transforming Swiss
democracy into a negotiation democracy.… [The aim of this is] … to
find a sufficiently strong compromise, allowing the future bill to be
enacted as law without a popular vote. (Kriesi and Trechsel, 2008: 58)
Nevertheless, formidable constraints on fostering more difference and plurality in
public spaces of traditional representative and liberal democratic regimes remain.
One of its most conspicuous forms is the so-called restoration of the primacy of
politics. The intention is to restore the political authority of elected politicians
in representative institutions over bureaucracy and scientific or corporatist
consultation and advice. Yet, as an attempt to increase democratic legitimacy it
is a naïve and cramped effort to reinforce the political myths of ‘we-the-people’
and popular sovereignty as vested in and represented by Parliament as the oneand-only source of political authority. Even the most superficial reality check of
this endeavour reveals its emptiness. It locks the elite of front-bench politicians
inside the walls of Parliament, the cages of party politics and the negotiations
with powerful interest groups. In addition, it condemns them to rely on the
media industry and the craft of spin doctors to bring political messages and
intentions across to the public at large, or particular segments of the population.
As political talk in the media inevitably deviates from political decisions taken in
parliamentary, party and interest politics, politicians open themselves up to easy
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Public engagement and deliberative designs
attacks of lack of transparency and hypocrisy. This, of course, undermines their
bid for primacy and authority.
Moreover, there is the pernicious combination of restoration of representative
democracy in agenda building, policy formulation and adoption, and better
implementation and service delivery through New Public Management. On the
face of it, the formula that politicians have to ‘steer’, but leave the ‘rowing’ to
public managers, is just another manifestation of the old politics/administration
divide, putting politicians in the lead and constructing civil servants as neutral
executors of political will. However, a second look at its practice under current
conditions reveals its destructive impact on the primacy of politics.The practical
translation of rowing/steering has frequently been that administrators and civil
servants dominate the actual interaction between citizens and the state, where
system meets life-world. Sometimes, they actively work to exclude politicians
from interactive and participatory policy-making exercises. More frequently,
elected politicians voluntarily back off (Bang, 2004: 172-3, 176-7; Monnikhof,
2006: 362; Cornips, 2008). The bulk of ordinary politicians thus find their jobs
hollowed out; their political function of dialogue and cooperation with citizens
usurped by administrators and public managers, especially where the latter practice
cultural and holistic governance.
In this way, ordinary politicians are deprived of first-hand learning about the
effects of administrative practices on the day-to-day lives of most citizens. Instead
of direct reports of citizens’ experiences, they have to rely on administrative and
financial accounting documents. Only in the case of obvious scandals and fiascoes,
they may decide to get immediate access to citizen experiences. Frequently this is
too little, too late. Between steering and rowing there actually is a no-man’s land,
which cannot but destroy politicians’ sources and antennae for political judgement
as the art and skill to assess the meaning of context-bound events and situations
in the light of more general principles and political values. Serious political
judgement rests on the accessibility of the particular and the specific in concrete
practices, in order to connect these practices to higher-order ethical beliefs and
political convictions about the proper functioning of the larger system (Beiner,
1983: 150;Van de Graaf and Hoppe, 1989: 97-9; Hoppe, 1993).
In many cases, it is only the administrators and public managers who have the
actual information to come to effective political judgements. However, mobilising
pluralism for better political judgement is not their priority, since they are
preoccupied to recruit the identities and skills of citizens in the service of their
own system objectives. Summarising a decade of Dutch experience and a large
number of in-depth analyses of interactive policy making, Monnikhof (2006:
372) reports ‘a lack of open acknowledgement of diverging interests in favor of a
“public interest” myth’ and hardly any serious attention to analytical contributions
of participants. Moreover, Hisschemöller et al (2009) claims that policy-analytical
methods that are frequently used in supporting interactive and participatory
policy making, such as brainstorming, focus groups, simulation and gaming,
policy delphis and backcasting, actually prevent the articulation and assessment
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The governance of problems
of conflicting knowledge claims. In other words, they in fact suppress, and not
generate or mobilise, plurality. Time or financial constraints are sometimes used
to put closure on plurality and debate.The famous Danish consensus conference
model of citizen participation uses severe time pressure to force a consensus in the
final, written reports to Parliament.3 The citizen working groups in the Danish
Integrated Urban Development Programme had to reach full consensus on its
proposals as a non-negotiable condition for getting the financial resources for
their implementation from the municipal government (Bang, 2004: 175).
Modes of participation and deliberation
Each of the four ‘democracies of problems’ has its own characteristic mode of
political participation by citizens or stakeholders. Using the types of participation
introduced in Chapter Six, problem-type–participation-type matches are summed
up in Figure 9.3.
Figure 9.3:Types of problem structures and corresponding types of citizen
participation
Far from
certainty on
required and
available
knowledge
Close to
certainty ...
UP
MSP(g)
Control/people’s initiatives,
corrective referendums
Partnership/hybrid forums
Partnerships/co-management etc
Consultation
Mobilisation or deliberation?
Capture or partnership?
MSP(m)
SP
Consultation
Partnership/co-regulation
Standing
Consumer choice
Standing
Principals or procedures?
Rule or voice?
Far from
agreement ...
Close to agreement on
norms and values at stake
Dealing with structured problems (SP) in closed networks of professional experts
most of the time is a matter of rule through autonomous professional-managerial
decisions on solution alternatives. Occasionally, key stakeholders may be granted a
voice by ad-hoc or structured contacts. Such contacts may be expanded to include
selected segments of the citizenry. In both cases, the management decides alone
in a manner that does or does not take stakeholders’ or citizens’ views seriously
into account. Respecting this rule regime, there are two major ways of giving
citizens more opportunities for voice. One is by traditional legal means, that is,
by giving citizens legal standing and access to review procedures, tribunals or
ombudsman-like arrangements. Legal standing is a weak influence restricted
to individuals; expanded to open and third-party standing, it is stronger. In the
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Public engagement and deliberative designs
shadow of representative democracy, legal standing and (administrative) review
procedures are not just a mode of citizen participation, but also a potential source
of information about detailed policy implementation for other political actors,
like elected politicians.
New Public Management thinking also impinges on citizen and stakeholder
participation in rules. On the one hand, maximising scope for management, less
weight is given to judicial appeals and review procedures. The less formal rules,
the better. On the other hand, New Public Management thinking is positive
about a louder citizen voice through more possibilities for consumer choice in
service delivery. Instruments explored and used include surveys and focus groups;
client councils ‘in the shadow of hierarchy’ (Schillemans, 2007: 271-2); but also
economic instruments like purchaser/provider splits, managed competition
between providers/suppliers, case management, and vouchers for users.
Moderately structured problems with goal consensus (MSP-g), dealt with in stable
policy networks through problem-driven research and negotiation, no doubt
have the most developed opportunities for stakeholder participation.The variety
of formal consultation and partnership arrangements is almost infinite; and they
are flanked by informal variants. In capitalist societies, business stakeholders enjoy
special privileges in public policy making (Lindblom, 1977; Flyvbjerg, 1998); even
to the extent that partnership relations degenerate into a capture of regulatory and
supervisory public agencies by the regulated and supervised interests.This danger
looms especially large in corporatist co-regulation and co-management forms of
partnership. In the Netherlands, longstanding co-regulation and co-management
partnerships in labour reintegration and incapacity-for-work issues between the
state, labour unions and employers’ associations had to be abolished in the 1990s
due to large-scale abuse by the private partners for their respective group interests.
In fact, labour unions and employers’ associations ‘socialised’ the costs of large-scale
economic reforms by sending taxpayers the bill for the overgenerous treatment
of laid-off workers (Visser and Hemerijck, 1997).
Another drawback of highly developed corporatist consultative and
partnership arrangements is that they exclude less-organised interests, nonexperts, communities and citizens from the regular policy-making arenas.This is
especially true at national levels of governance. However, at subnational, regional,
provincial and community levels, unorganised and organised ordinary citizens
do have easier access to partnership arrangements such as co-production and
community-based co-management, where government and interest groups and/or
citizens cooperate in implementing a policy.Think of the many Neighbourhood
Watch projects in public safety, or community clean-up and development plans
in urban redevelopment, or involving farmers and communities in soil or nature
conservation or waste treatment programmes, or fishermen in fisheries policy
(Kooiman et al, 2005). Frequently in such programmes, joint fact-finding practices
make all participants jointly responsible for establishing a shared ‘database’ accessible
to all – instead of leaving this task entirely to experts. Joint fact-finding is the
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The governance of problems
core of a growing literature on methods for (externally) extended peer review
(Funtowicz and Ravetz, 1992;Van Asselt, 2000;Van Buuren and Edelenbos, 2004).
Coping with moderately structured problems with politically divisive value dissent
(MSP-m) through strategies of discourse coalition building in designed networks,
aiming at accommodation and pacification of open conflict, is an inherently
somewhat elitist endeavour. Consultation practice will focus on participation
by those who have a contribution to make to ‘peace-keeping’ policy ideas and a
policy discourse of expressive overdetermination (see Chapter Four).This means
recruitment of some immediate stakeholders, usually moderate, reasonable and
realistic representatives of the conflicting parties. They are complemented by
potential mediators, clarifiers, or other specialists in norm generation. Sometimes
hybrid commissions of Wise Persons, consisting of reputed politicians, prudent
scientists, representatives of contending parties, problem specialists and legal
specialists prepare reports that may become the basis for parliamentary legislation.
In other cases, permanent ethical commissions defuse and depoliticise issues,
hoping to generate consensual norms, values and policy practices in the process.
Professional co-regulation and legal standing, usually in tandem, may be important
elements in the participation repertoire for dealing with moderately structured
problems (means). As demonstrated in Chapters Four and Six, an important way
of taming ‘wicked’ ethical issues is to find some professional paradigm, which
expressively overdetermines the conflicting principled positions of contenders
on both sides of the issue. If such a paradigm can be found or constructed, it
may be turned into the basis of formal legislation and policy; with delegation of
day-to-day implementation and application to individual cases to the relevant
professional community, which develops some kind of protocol for prudent and
careful professional treatment. This is a mode of professional co-regulation. In
order to guarantee transparency and public accountability, professional conduct
is tied to particular legal sanctions, laid down in official legislation. In the Dutch
abortion case, the conservative pro-life and feminist pro-choice positions were
expressively overdetermined by some combination of a medical (‘doctors may
abort on medical indications’) and a clinical-psychological (‘abortion signals
problematic parental relationships’) paradigm. Lest these professional communities
became too autonomous, they were tied to certain procedural rules, specified by
law; and leading to prosecution in case of violation. From a problem-processing
perspective, it should be stressed that the importance of the legal instrument and
legal standing for citizens is not just the possibility for sanctions. A string of court
reviews of concrete cases provides policy actors access to detailed information on
implementation and application practice. In due time, this may lead to amended
legislation, or adaptations in the protocols for proper professional conduct.
Intractable, ‘wicked’ or unstructured problems (UP) need learning processes to be
organised somehow in open issue networks. Such learning processes, it has been
argued, require maximising equality between citizens and pluralism of views for
their success. Pluralism is necessary because dealing with unstructured problems
requires ‘prismatic’ looking at an issue, from as many different positions or angles
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Public engagement and deliberative designs
as is possible. Equality is required because only participation on an equal footing
has a chance of maximising plurality and the mutual learning that is supposed
to follow from being exposed to the views of other citizens. Catalysing mutual
learning as dealing with unstructured or ‘wicked’ problems has a central place
in the system of meta-governance as interpolable balancing. It acts as a kind of
hothouse for political judgement and learning about problem decomposition
and sorting (see Figure 9.4).
Figure 9.4: Political judgement as a decomposition and sorting device in learning
about unstructured problems
Learning about
structured problems
Moderately
structured problems
(means)
Moderately
structured problems
(goals)
Structured problems
This is what was anticipated when it was argued, in Chapter Three, that, from
a policy maker’s perspective, it makes sense to deconstruct well-entrenched
problem frames, and treat them as if they were unstructured. Apart from that,
in real politics and policy making, some such traditional problem definitions do
become unsettled and thus appropriate for reconsideration. In a sense, experiments
in participatory-cum-deliberative democracy may be viewed as the ‘gear box’
enabling, as Connolly (1987: 141) puts it: ‘Modern politics [to] simultaneously
operate to unsettle dimensions that have assumed a fixed character and to achieve
a temporary settlement in areas where a common decision is needed but the
resources of knowledge or administrative procedure are insufficient to resolve
the issue.’
In fact, a lot of institutional tinkering is currently going on in this field
of injecting more deliberative quality4 and direct citizen participation in
representative democracies (Fung, 2003;Williamson and Fung, 2004; Van Stokkom,
2006). Any effort at generalisation, therefore, is premature and should be taken
with considerable grains of salt. Nevertheless, it looks like four broad categories
of participatory-cum-deliberative projects may be distinguished: formal control,
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The governance of problems
participation as ‘mini-people’, participation and consultation as ‘mini-public’, and
collaborative, hybrid forums and knowledge centres.
First, there are efforts to hand over formal control of an issue from Parliaments
to the electorate. Examples are proposals for several types of referendums, for
electronic voting, for participatory budgeting5, or Dahl’s (1989) proposal for
a ‘minipopulus’, or Van Stokkom’s (2006) idea of a ‘citizen chamber’. Normal
referendums and electronic voting by themselves are clearly unsuitable for dealing
with unstructured problems. Yet, people’s initiatives and corrective referendums
would give citizens a means of signalling gross mismatches between dominant
governmental problem frames and alternative framings alive in large segments
of the public.6 The same goes for proposals for a ‘minipopulus’ or a ‘citizen
chamber’. Their idea is to create a ‘mini-people’ through random selection of, say,
1,000 citizens. After deliberative processes supported by electronic means, expert,
administrative and stakeholder hearings, and perhaps commissioned research, such a
body could decide on an agenda of issues, which co-determines the parliamentary
agenda. Each issue could be discussed and deliberated by some segment of the
‘minipopulus’; the result would be a formal input to governmental decision
making and the legislative process. This could take the shape of, for example,
an obligation to publicly account for any substantial deviation from the citizen
chamber’s proposal.
The ‘mini-people’ form of participation-cum-deliberation keeps alive the notion of
representativeness through random selection of citizen participants.There are many
forms of this second method, like participation as partnership that also aspires to weak
forms of representation through random selection. They are commissioned by a
public agency, and involve citizens in aspects of governmental policy formulation
through advisory boards, citizens’ advisory panels, public inquiries and so on.
To be mentioned here are citizen juries, planning cells, consensus conferences
and government-initiated public debates. Much more practiced is the third
method: creating a ‘mini-public’ through stakeholder participation and consultation,
for example in the much-practiced so-called ‘hybrid forums’ or ‘platforms at
national and regional government levels (Kern and Smith, 2008; Merkx, 2008).
With no claim to representativeness, political and policy actors have more scope
to tailor the composition of the mini-public to the (rather, their views of the)
needs of the issue for deliberation. Most of the time, this entails possibilities for
more structured processes of deliberative policy analysis, like future or scenario
or backcasting workshops, strategic conferences, gaming exercises and decision
conferencing (for an overview, see Mayer, 1997: 81ff). Both features probably
make for the popularity among policy makers of this third participation method
of creating mini-publics of stakeholders. Of course, there is a danger of overdesigning stakeholder participation, thereby reducing its function as mobilising
plurality for learning about unstructured policy issues.
Perhaps, one could discern a fourth ‘method’. The word ‘method’ is bracketed
because, in this form of participation, government commissioning and issue
delineation are more or less absent. For developments in the US, Fung and
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Public engagement and deliberative designs
Williamson (2004: 11-12) speak of ‘collaborative forums’ as open citizen forums
that create opportunities for gathering and discussing issues through presentation
of information and ‘working through’ processes to arrive at responsible political
judgements (Yankelovich, 1991).They are typically promoted by civic associations
and organisations dedicated to improving the quality of citizen deliberation and
public debate on important policy issues, like the National Issue Forums initiated
by the Kettering Foundation.
Different from such grassroots initiatives is the development of ‘knowledge
centres’ (Halffman and Hoppe, 2005: 144).They originate in bottom-up initiatives
by policy experts and practitioners.They claim to make knowledge more available
for policy use, either by integrating knowledge, simply accumulating knowledge
or by performing a role as knowledge broker. Knowledge centres see themselves
as facilitators of a collective and public learning process, targeted at nongovernmental or governmental practitioners and citizens in general, rather than
central government policy makers in particular.Their organisational form ranges
from merely a portal website, run by a handful of people, to the research facilities of
university research centres. Always, they operate chatrooms and offer other means
for communication and deliberation between users. This means that knowledge
centres, although sometimes originally formed around traditional disciplines or
policy domains, can operate across well-delineated problem areas, research fields
or professional jurisdictions. It is such cross-cutting potential between disciplines,
between policy domains, and between government and civic society that makes
for possible ‘new combinations’ (Van der Heijden, 2005).
Both collaborative hybrid forums or platforms and knowledge centres are
potential ‘hot houses’ for innovative policy ideas on dealing with unstructured
problems. In their hypothetical new problem decompositions they may hit on
ideas for new problem structuring that move large chunks or smaller selected parts
of unstructured problems to any of the other three problem types that are more
amenable to policy-making routines in representative democracies. However, this is
far easier said than done. Designing and running experiments in deliberative-cumparticipatory policy making for unstructured problems is haunted by its character
as an alien element in a representative democracy. Frequently, when political
mobilisation for agenda status and decision making is in full swing, deliberation
and learning have to be ‘smuggled into’ agonistic policy arenas. Sometimes, special
forward-looking institutes on particular issue areas, like the Rathenau Institute
in the Netherlands and the former Office of Technology Assessment in the US,
attempt to initiate and ignite public debates on issues that in the (near) future
will become politically salient but are as yet unknown to vested political interests,
or declared anathema.
Goodin and Dryzek (2006: 219) speak of the problem of the ‘macro-political
uptake of minipublics’. Papadopoulos and Warin (2007: 460) strike at the heart
of the problem when they state:
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The governance of problems
A crucial problem is that of the uneasy coupling of decisional arenas
that operate under different principles of legitimation: deliberation
and negotiation between (sometimes collective) stakeholders in
participatory procedures versus competition for authorisation in the
representative circuit.
To illustrate the problems in mini-public deliberative projects, some of the
dilemmas and perplexities of democratic experiments in structuring unstructured
problems will be discussed in the next section.The focus will be on the stakeholder
variant of creating a mini-public, both because this mode is more practised; but
also because it brings out the problems into sharper relief.
Perplexities of democratic experiments in problem
structuring
As said, at present a lot of research is going on about the design, running, outputs
and outcomes of democratic experiments (Mayer, 1997: 231ff; Fung, 2003; Loeber,
2004: 261ff; Papadopoulos and Warin, 2007; Hisschemöller et al, 2009). In bringing
some order to the discussion of typical problems, Loeber’s model of a mini-public
deliberative project as research object will be used.7 (see Figure 9.5) The model
grasps the dynamics of such a project in depicting it as deliberative interactions
among a variety of actors trying to come to joint political judgement, distributed
over time and in space.This allows ordering the discussion in simple terms of input
(t0-t1), throughput (t1-t2), output (t2) and outcome (t2-tx). Input is the preparation
stage of the project, before the actual deliberative process commences (t1) and
the frequently not so easily determinable moment when preparations seriously
start (t0). During the input stage, the project’s aspirations, its problem framing(s)
and the envisaged outputs are formulated. The end or output of the project (t2)
supposedly coincides with the formulation of some end-conclusion or advisory
report, and its immediate ‘selling’ activities to key addressees. The impact or
outcome of the project may be a multidimensional process continuing for quite
some time, so that a clear endpoint usually cannot be given (tx).
Input problems
In the input phase of a stakeholder variant of mini-public deliberative projects
(M-PDPs), the same questions have to be answered as for any exercise in policy
analysis, design and evaluation: who is to deliberate for whom on what, why, when
and how (Van de Graaf and Hoppe, 1996: 385-92; Fung, 2003); or, whom to serve
(Lindblom and Woodhouse, 1993)? As will be shown, these questions cohere and
give rise to difficult choices when it comes to maximising plurality and ensuring
some power balance or equality in view of learning about unstructured problems.
Institutional constraints of representative democracy usually mean that
government itself, government agencies or Parliaments commission M-PDPs.
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Public engagement and deliberative designs
Figure 9.5: Simple timeframe model of a mini-public deliberative project
space
Deliberative project
Policy
domain
time
Policy
network
t0
t1
t2
tx
Exchange of information between project and political context
The Dutch Cabinet decided to conduct M-PDPs as part of its deliberations on
whether or not to allow further expansion of Schiphol Airport and the Rotterdam
Harbour. The Department of Transport and Water Management organised a
number of M-PDP’s under the label of ‘future ateliers’ in order to boost the
creativity and out-of-the-box thinking of their own policy design on large-scale
infrastructure. The Dutch Parliament decided that its own deliberations about
GM food policy ought to be simultaneously flanked by a large-scale societal
debate on the same issue.
The examples given already show why such M-PDPs are organised. Vested
political bodies try to escape normal policy-making and decision-making
routines and create a temporary niche for ‘fresh’ thinking and frank or open
deliberation. This implies that the ‘when’ question is answered by looking at
politically opportune moments, or fortuitous timing in the policy cycle, from
the vantage point of normal policy players. This lends most of these exercises an
ad-hoc, non-recurrent and non-formal character.The implications for the roles of
both politicians and analysts/organisers in M-PDPs are profound. Politicians may
have an interest in ordering a deliberative experiment, not in participating in it.
Rather, they have an interest in just waiting for the results, and only then deciding
on whether or not to use them. In other words, they are perhaps interested in
M-PDPs for better quality of deliberations feeding them with fresh ideas, certainly
not for more democratic decisions. At best, they pledge to take the outputs of
an M-PDP seriously; but they almost never promise to follow it completely or
even partially. In the interest of frank and open deliberation, they even find a
rationale not to participate themselves. Partly there is merit in this argument. If
the claims, concerns and issues of politicians come to dominate the deliberative
process, freshness and openness may suffer. In addition, there are good reasons for
scepticism about politicians’ potential strategic and creative contributions to the
debate (Bang, 2004: 172-3; Sørensen and Torfing, 2005: 215).
As for the policy analysts/organisers, their relation to the client commissioning
the deliberative experiment is like professional civil servants or hired consultants.
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The governance of problems
Of course, this fact will be perceived by the participants and thus influence their
attitudes and conduct towards them. In addition, most of the responsibility in
answering the other questions on the design of the M-PDP falls to them. These
questions are about the precise delineation of subject and scope of the deliberative
process (what?), about participant recruitment and selection (who?, also why?),
about prior alignment between commissioner, analyst (team) and participants
about methodical aspects and closure of the deliberative process, including the
analysts’ role(s) itself (how?). Moreover, these questions are interrelated in many
ways.
Substantive and participation closure in M-PDPs are highly interrelated.
For instance, issue and scope determination is heavily influenced by balancing
between two perspectives. One is substantive closure through loyalty to the
claims, concerns and issues moving the commissioner in organising an M-PDP.
The other is to let closure be more pragmatically arrived at through participant
recruitment and selection, which requires responsive focusing (Loeber, 2004:
289) by taking seriously the claims, concerns and issues of the (prospective)
participants themselves. Inviting certain stakeholders to participate means
inclusion or exclusion, highlighting or de-emphasising certain aspects of the issue.
Delimiting the scope of the issue, especially in time or institutionalised policy
domain, includes, excludes or marginalises certain participants.This chicken-andegg problem between issue delimitation and participant recruitment affects the
entire deliberation process and its closure. In truly responsive focusing, participants
influence the borders drawn around an issue. However, should new stakeholders
be invited when the issue broadens, and some previously invited stakeholders leave
the project if the issue becomes more narrowly circumscribed? Will commissioners
still be interested in financing M-PDPs if they effectively have to fully respect
the unstructured nature of issues by giving to participants every right to redefine
and restructure the issue?
How are the ‘stakeholders’ constructed by the initiators; what are the ‘stakes’
and who are the ‘holders’, especially if the issue for deliberation is messy or
wicked indeed? How to avoid the participation paradox, that is, that those most
likely to have contributions to make are those who will make themselves heard
anyway in the normal venues of policy making? How to deal with ‘stakes’ that
are short term, but issues that are long range? How to find ‘holders’ if the ‘stakes’
are future generations of people, or nature? Should there be ‘hot’ deliberation
between opinionated, maybe prejudiced participants with high stakes in the issue;
or should one go for ‘cold’ deliberation between open-minded participants with
lower stakes in the issue (Fung, 2003: 345)? Here ‘who?’ spills over into the ‘how
best to deliberate’ question.
Meanwhile, deliberative policy analysts have developed a rather well-stocked
toolkit of methods. However, key questions about the political biases of these
methods, their propensities in eliciting or suppressing true pluralism of views, their
catalytic functions for mutual learning and their impact on the quality of debate
between participants, have hardly drawn sufficient attention (but see Hisschemöller,
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Public engagement and deliberative designs
2005, 2009). Given that M-PDPs cost time, money and personnel, concerning
the ‘how?’ question there is a lot of implicit and unacknowledged influence by
commissioners, who usually constrain all of the above. For example, although
detailed studies show that ‘ordinary’ policy preparation processes on complex issues
by civil servants from several departments take between two and four years (Hoppe
et al, 1995), the time given for the completion of M-PDPs hardly ever surpasses
six months to one year. In practice, this means that analysts/organisers have to
pay more attention to project than to process management.This bears heavily on
the issue of closure in deliberations. Novel ideas simply require time to emerge,
participants need time to learn to understand each other’s perspectives and ideas,
and then to jointly elaborate new ideas into some state of ‘joint construction’ or
maturity for serious political consideration. Given unrealistic time constraints,
policy analysts/organisers have to use rather crude methods for bringing debates
to closure (like the arbitrary time constraints mentioned above); or, alternatively,
have to avoid the issue of closure and yet, somehow, write up some allegedly
‘shared’ conclusions. If stakeholders subsequently refrain from (publicly) endorsing
them, politicians can hardly be expected to pay serious attention.
Another way in which the ‘who?’ and ‘how?’ questions interfere is in
determining the purpose of the M-PDP. If only creativity and novelty of ideas
matter, one would rather avoid participants with some relationship to the ‘usual
suspects’ in the relevant policy network. However, when analysts are at all able
to recruit truly visionary and creative participants from outside the well-known
pools of expertise,‘outsider’ participation will reduce the probability of uptake of
the output of the deliberative exercise in normal policy making. The other way
round, maximising chances for uptake by deliberate recruitment of participants
with a clear reputation and stature with a ‘constituency’ of vested stakeholder
groups may impair the quality and creativity of debate (Loeber, 2004: 226-7).
Throughput problems
In the actual process of deliberation, the ‘how?’ questions starts to loom large.
There may be a well-stocked toolkit of methods for deliberative and framereflective, participatory policy analysts. Yet, this does not mean a well-developed,
articulated consensus among analysts on the methodology for conducting
M-PDPs. At best, one may speak of practitioners who discuss their experiences
with peers in what may become an international community of practice. In spite
of methodological indeterminacy, there are general ambitions and guidelines
for sparking off responsible political judgement and learning in M-PDP’s about
unstructured problems. Inspired by Loeber (2004: 61-9), three maxims appear to
orient such deliberative process:
• M-PDPs allow both ‘spectator’ and ‘actor’ perspectives on unstructured problems:
‘Analysis that is intended to inform political judgment should adopt a
hermeneutic approach to data collection which does not rule out the possibility
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The governance of problems
or legitimacy of employing empirical-analytic methods to assess relevant facts,
and which allows for a deliberative mode of exchanging information that
results from such an assessment.’
• M-PDPs foster not just a meeting of horizons, but make a serious effort at a
fusion of horizons: ‘Analysis that is intended to inform political judgment should
be organized as a participatory process, in which actors representing different
perspectives on an issue participate in such a way that their “particularities”
and viewpoints are sufficiently acknowledged in the deliberation to bear on
the resulting problem definition.’
• M-PDPs are about learning about action: ‘Analysis that is intended to inform
political judgment should be organized in such a way that it may induce
learning on the part of the participants as a result of an exchange of information
(i) on the problem situation, (ii) on the way others define the problem, and
(iii) on the particularities of the contexts in which these others operate, so as
to make possible a reflection on their own interpretive frames, and to enable
participants [to reflect on the conditions in the real world, under which they
can, RH] act in line with the new insights.’
In practice, these guidelines or maxims pose challenges to three interrelated
problem clusters: fostering conditions for real learning, maintaining some sort of
power balance between participants with sometimes very unequal resources in
the real world, and the role(s) of the analyst/organiser.
The spectator/actor split in deliberation requires accommodation of quantitative
and qualitative research and findings in M-PDPs. As many stakeholders are
used to, and scientific experts are trained in quantitative research methods and
findings, dealing with qualitative approaches is considered problematic – even
though qualitative approaches are intrinsically more suitable for deliberative
exercises. In addition, scientists operate in disciplinary ‘tribes’ of peers. In M-PDPs
on unstructured problems, they find themselves exposed to multidisciplinary
contexts and highly unusual forms of peer review, extending even to nonscientists. For many scientists it is very hard to unlearn to think and act through
disciplinary paradigms, and become truly open to interdisciplinary collaboration
and transdisciplinary, extended peer review. Analysts/organisers should be careful
to invite scientists with the requisite attitude and skills. More often than not,
scientists have a role to play in M-PDPs as experts or expert advisers.To the extent
that knowledge is power, their role vis-à-vis the non-scientific participants is
ambivalent. On the one hand, it is argued that scientific information is unequally
distributed; hence, for the sake of an equal power balance, information deficits
should be counteracted through lectures, consultations and other means of making
scientific information available. On the other hand, this invokes the deficit model
in public understanding of science, which invites scientists to be teachers and
all others to be students. Since deliberation, not education, is the purpose of an
M-PDP, the teacher–student roles may insert the very power imbalances they
were intended to remedy.
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Public engagement and deliberative designs
Regarding the effort to go beyond a mere exchange of perspectives and achieve
some kind of fusion of horizons as closure in deliberation, analysts and participants
suffer from ignorance and gaps in their knowledge. So far, insights into the impact
of emotional dynamics, rhetoric, eloquence and charisma in M-PDPs on the
power balance between participants and the quality of debate and deliberation is
limited (Van Stokkom, 2005, 2006). Usually, it is doable to check for increases in
instrumental or first-order learning among participants. But it is much harder to
show second-order learning, that is, a certain method’s effectiveness in inducing
serious reflection on their own interpretive frames among participants; let alone
increased skills in coming to shared insights in constructive political judgements,
or learning to learn (third-order learning) itself. Consequently, it proves very
difficult to establish the quality level of a debate, and therefore the value-added of
deliberation in M-PDPs compared to, say, debates among experienced politicians
in parliamentary subcommittees (Pellizoni, 2001; Steiner et al, 2004; Hisschemöller
et al, 2009).
All this impinges on the so-called expertise and role of the deliberative analyst or
organiser of M-PDPs. It was already pointed out above that the usual institutional
setting of an M-PDP forces the analyst/organiser into the role of public servant or
hired consultant. Hence, the other participants ascribe to them an inherent interest
in consensus creation and producing knowledge usable for their commissioner
or principal. Even when the analyst/organiser is prepared to take some action
in guarding the power balance among participants, this role ascription will
impair such efforts. But apart from that, even if both commissioner and analyst
are committed to real change in standing policies and political judgements and
framings of unstructured problems, what is the role of the analyst vis-à-vis the
other participants? Facilitator, process manager, project manager, director of the
show, counsellor to all parties, interpreter between all parties, change agent for
the commissioner or servant for empowerment of the weaker parties?
Output and outcome problems
Path dependence theory suggests that the weight of the past may block serious
policy change. Policy choices that are objects of deliberation in M-PDPs may be
so locked in chains of past choices, that they are not easily unlocked. On top of
that, the point with mini-public and stakeholder projects is that their output and
outcome problems are quite comparable to those of non-routine, non-incremental
administrative policy making.The problem is how to find a niche somewhere to
think creatively, and engage in serious deliberation; and, returning from the niche
with some fresh and productive ideas, how to insert them into normal political
power games (Hoppe, 1983) and ongoing public-opinion-forming and sociallearning processes. After the deliberate suspension of power differentials and
lifting the constraints on deliberation and debate deriving from ‘normal’ political
manoeuvring and strategising, all the institutional constraints return in full force
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The governance of problems
to test the robustness of an M-PDP’s results. Goodin and Dryzek (2006: 219) call
this the problem of the ‘macro-political up-take of mini-publics’.
Such uptake depends, first, on the dissemination strategies of the M-PDP’s direct
output. In fact, in many cases a carefully elaborated trajectory for follow-up care
is considered an integral part an M-PDP. Potentially, there are many different
types of addressees; and each one requires a different dissemination strategy.
Igniting a large-scale public debate is very different from briefing department’s
policy-making officials who may be interested in using the M-PDP’s ideas in
their own policy proposals. In the former case, highly visible public figures may
be recruited to present the major messages to influential media in popularised
ways. In the latter case, picking a reputable analyst to give oral presentations
and run a workshop or small conference is more effective. Which dissemination
strategies are most effective for which audiences, or in influencing important
policy-making and political decision-making processes, is an empirical matter.
Another issue for more empirical research is the potential feed-forward between
choice of methods during the deliberation process (the throughput phase) and
dissemination strategy (output phase). There are cases where the commissioning
party is willing to compromise the M-PDP’s integrity as a deliberative-interpretive
project in the wrapping up of its conclusions and activities, in order to facilitate
its dissemination and boost its persuasive power to relevant non-participating
audiences and interests (Loeber, 2004: 277-8, 292).
More generally, dissemination is a balancing act. On the one hand, one would
want to safeguard the integrity of the deliberative project in outputs that convey,
if only vicariously, the experience of intense deliberation and the efforts spent in
getting to meaningful, valid closure. On the other hand, one is almost forced to give
in to the pressure of the media, politicians and interest groups for soundbite-like
summaries of the major message. Part of the dissemination efforts is for the sake
of accountability of the commissioner and organiser to the public. Fung (2003:
346) writes that this is of particular relevance ‘if we do not take it for granted (…)
that deliberation and negotiation between stakeholders necessarily yield outputs
that are beneficial to the public interest. If this is uncertain, then participatory
procedures must be all the more subject to … ex post control.’ In addition, the
commissioner and organiser will desire to prevent others from selectively shopping
or cherry picking from the proposals resulting from an M-PDP’s total output.
However, much like authors cannot prevent readers from producing their own
interpretation of a text, so the disseminators of M-PDPs’ outputs cannot control
the longer-term outcomes. Hopefully, there is the ripple effect of throwing a
pebble in the pond, but this is uncertain. Goodin and Dryzek (2006: 225-37) list
several potentially beneficial effects of M-PDPs.8 Their outputs may in the near
or longer future be taken up in normal policy-making and political decisionmaking processes. Media coverage of M-PDPs’ outputs, if sufficiently extensive,
may inform larger publics and help in sparking off public debates. M-PDPs may
function somewhat like focus groups in marketing strategies. They ‘market test’
particular policy ideas for feasibility and acceptability for key stakeholders in
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Public engagement and deliberative designs
society. Because participant recruitment for M-PDPs is considered a rather open
procedure, they resist the co-optive politics of bringing in (alleged) opponents
of proposed policies in standard consultation processes. M-PDPs can function
as legitimatory devices for policies in whose production they are a part. The
above-mentioned cases of expansion of Schiphol Airport and a second Rotterdam
Harbour offer perfect examples.
Unfortunately, Goodin and Dryzek do not pay attention to other effects of
M-PDPs, especially in relation to their embeddedness in an institutional setting
of representative democracy. For example, following in the footsteps of Murray
Edelman, one may as well consider the market-testing and legitimation effect
of deliberative-cum-participatory exercises a mere symbolic ornament to the
representative and corporatist modes of governance. The appearance of open
participation in deliberative processes lends additional legitimacy to policies already
considered, proposed and (almost) decided upon by elites. The ad-hoc character
of many M-PDPs may even lead one to hypothesise that they channel away
urgent political issues from genuine public debate in agonistic political settings
of political mobilisation and agenda building. M-PDPs might be just one more
instrument for depoliticisation and agenda control.
Many civic associations and non-governmental organisations are deeply involved
in developing alternative problem framings and alternatives to dominant opinions
about solutions.Yet, they frequently refuse to participate in M-PDPs on issues of
their intense concern because they do not trust the intentions of the authorities
that set them up. In the Dutch GM-food public debate, environmental groups
and other associations walked out of the organised public debate because they felt
cheated about their possibilities for influencing the agenda and focus of debate
(Hage, 2002). More generally, they consider M-PDP’s as public relations machines
for manipulating public opinion. They see themselves as the legitimate problem
owners; and much better representatives of a critical public opinion and a larger
public than those invited by authorities to participate. In systems of representative
democracy, authorities that initiate deliberative experiments on an ad-hoc basis,
yet fail to institutionalise relations between deliberative procedures, representative
bodies and their normal processes of decision making, do indeed deserve suspicion.
By keeping open the option for themselves to not even respond to the outputs and
recommendations of M-PDPs, they give the impression of not taking seriously
procedures they have themselves set in motion (Joly and Marris, 2003).
In discussing the problems and perplexities of actually conducting deliberativecum-participatory policy exercises in the context of representative democratic
institutions and modes of governance, we have in fact hit upon an important
gap in the meta-theory on democracies of problems as formulated in Chapter
Eight.There, from a system’s perspective, relationships between the four matches
of problem structure type and democracy type were considered complementary.
Hence, the possibility of thinking about meta-governance as shifting from
one match to another; and, given the delays of path dependence and the
hypercomplexity of capitalist and democratic governance systems, gently nudging
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The governance of problems
the entire system to more deliberative modes through relatively unobtrusive
strategies of interpolable balancing, like layering and conversion. Nevertheless,
this picture may well be too rosy. A politics of deliberation will always meet its
limits in a politics of vision and/or power (Dauenhauer, 1986). Therefore, in the
concluding chapter, some blacks and greys will be mixed into the overall picture in
order not to lose sight of the ironies of real power politics, and thereby safeguard
reflexivity in meta-governance.
Notes
Obama’s campaign team allegedly heavily relied on the new media and internet to
mobilise especially the younger segments of the electorate.Thus, one has to await a more
definitive analysis of Barack Obama’s successful presidential campaign to know whether
this judgement can be upheld.
1
Schudson (1998: 310-3111) discusses ‘monitorial citizenship’ as implying that ‘the …
citizen engages in environmental surveillance more than information-gathering’:‘I would
propose that the obligation of citizens to know enough to participate intelligently in
governmental affairs be understood as a monitorial obligation. Monitorial citizens scan
(rather than read) the informational environment in a way so that they may be alerted
to a wide variety of issues for a wide variety of ends and may be mobilized around those
issue in a large variety of ways.’
2
Teknologi Radet (www.tekno.dk/subpage.php3?article=468andtoppic=kategori12an
dlanguage=uk; emphasis added): ‘The conference runs from Friday to Monday.… On
the first day of the official conference programme, experts answer the questions posed in
advance by the lay panel.… On the Saturday, the panel asks the expert panel to elaborate
and clarify their presentations and the audience is also allowed to ask questions. Following
the conclusion of the official part of the conference at noon on the Saturday, the citizens’
panel begins discussing the expert presentations. The goal is for the panel to achieve consensus
and to subsequently write the final document with their assessments and recommendation. On the
Sunday, the citizens’ panel continues discussing and formulating the content of the final
document. Typically, the work of the panel goes on throughout the night and is not concluded until
consensus regarding the document has been reached. The last day of the conference begins with
the panel presenting their final document to the conference participants.’
3
One could also mention efforts to make traditional, formal institutes in representative
democracy, like Parliaments and expert advisory bodies, more deliberative and reflexive;
examples for the Dutch situation are given by Halffman and Hoppe (2005: 145-6).
4
5
A short description is given in Fung (2003: 360-2).
Kriesi and Trechsel (2008: 115) state that, in Switzerland, all political actors capable of
making a credible referendum threat – including major interest groups and even social
movement organisations – have been integrated into the decision-making process by
6
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Public engagement and deliberative designs
way of elaborate pre-parliamentary consultation procedures. Obviously, then, the mere
possibility of a referendum forces political elites to pay more attention to all kinds of
people’s representatives.
Loeber’s descriptive model has been successfully applied in detailed comparative
descriptions, analyses and evaluations of three cases: the Phosphate Forum on clean laundry
and clean water, the Novel Protein Foods project on sustainable technology development
and the Gideon project on developing proposals on sustainable crop production for the
Dutch Parliament.
7
I have left out positive effects to be expected only from other than stakeholder-directed
forms of deliberative projects, such as popular oversight, confidence building, and political
mobilisation due to participation.
8
241
TEN
Responsible and hopeful
governance of problems
We need to accept the impossibility of reasoning all the way to
solutions, thus leaving generous room for power and arbitrariness.
(Lindblom, 1999: 63)
Since … in the density of social reality each decision brings unexpected
consequences, and since, moreover, man responds to these surprises by
inventions which transform the problem, there is no situation without
hope…. (Maurice Merleau-Ponty, quoted in Dauenhauer, 1986: 246)
Introduction
This final chapter is devoted to reflecting on the answers to the questions
formulated in Chapter Two. It looks back on the intellectual journey in this book,
and asks how far we have come.Thus, the first section is a succinct list of answers
to the questions raised about the governance of problems – about the meaning of
the ‘governance of problems’ perspective itself, about the translation dynamics in
socio-political contexts, about the framing and design dynamics or policy-analytic aspects,
and about participation and democracy from an institutional or polity-oriented
perspective. The second section picks up an implied question that has deliberately
been sidestepped so far, that is, the dilemmatic relationship between puzzling
and powering. It was argued that meta-governance as deliberate interpolable
balancing is the only possibility of creating more space for deliberative-democratic
policy making. However, one should be aware of the inevitable tension between
powering and puzzling in policy problem structuring. Even though better
deliberative-cum-participatory designs and more institutional spaces may lead to
more successful avoidance of wrong-problem problems, the methods, rules and
procedures of problem-sensitive and frame-reflective policy analysis may well be
instrumentalised as one way of power politics, or fighting over policy. The last
section grapples with the issue of how to respond to this inevitable tendency.
Propositions on the governance of problems
What does the ‘governance of problems’ mean?
The fundamental idea of the book was that it makes sense to see democratic
politics as a question-and-answer game, and policy making as the governance
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of problems. The possibility of viewing politics as a question-and-answer game,
and policy making as an interrogatory debate on collective problems, is rooted
in an image of man as freedom-in-responsibility, as ‘homo respondens’.The focus
on problem processing derives from another image-of-man assumption, namely
that man is unity-in-disharmony. The disharmony between man and his own
self-image, between man and fellow human beings, and between ‘is’ and ‘ought’,
turns the question-and-answer game into a contest between those who may pose
which question, when, to whom; and those whose answers are to count, and why.
The entire spectacle – the ensemble of institutions, beliefs, practices and rules in
use by rulers and ruled to manage the question-and-answer game – was called
the governance of problems.To get a rich picture, this governance of problems ought
to be studied from three different, but interdependent angles – governance as
puzzling, powering and participation.
A second key notion was that in the governance of problems, problem finding
deserves at least equal, and perhaps more, attention than problem solving. In dayto-day politics and professional policy analysis, however, it is the other way
round. Legitimation of answers through a mix of rules for political authority and
scientific methodology is more important than posing the right questions. Hence,
much policy analysis is the sophisticated answer to a wrong problem. The rest of
the book is a sustained reflection on what better avoidance of wrong-problem
problems means for policy analysis. In an important sense, it is a rethinking and
updating of the Lasswellian idea, dating from the 1950s, of policy analysis as a
problem-oriented intellectual endeavour. The later turn from government to
governance, and the simultaneous scientisation of politics and politicisation of
science (Weingart, 1983; Hoppe, 2005) make such a rethinking unavoidable for
the viability of the field of policy analysis.
To get more grip on this broad problématique, three sets of questions about the
governance of problems were distinguished (see Figure 2.4, Chapter Two):
• questions about translation dynamics, that is, how policy designs are attributed
meaning in the socio-political contexts of cultures in society and policy
networks;
• questions about framing and design dynamics, this is, about problem structuring
as cognitive process, about how and why problem framings are socially and
politically constructed and distributed by analysts and practitioners; and
• questions about institutions for the framing and design dynamics, and modes of
citizen participation in these dynamics.
Answers to these questions developed in this book are listed below as propositions
on the governance of problems.
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Translation dynamics in the governance of problems
The first question in this set was: how to usefully conceptualise problem structuring
and problem structures? The answer is given through a typology of policy problem
structures and a number of related propositions:
1. Image-of man-assumptions: human beings act boundedly, ecologically and socially
rational.
2. Proximate and authoritative policy makers are prone to using an acceptability
heuristic in accounting for their preferences and choices in problem framing
and problem definition.
3. Acting on an acceptability heuristic, they confront different potential situations,
depending on degree of consensus on norms and values at stake, and degree of
certainty about required and available knowledge (for solving the problem as
framed or defined).
4. An authoritative public policy problem definition is structured, if the proximate
and authoritative policy makers, as members of a dominant advocacy coalition
or policy community, are closer to agreement on norms and values at stake,
and closer to certainty on required and available knowledge.
5. A problem definition is unstructured, the more policy makers in an issue network
disagree on norms and values at stake, and remain uncertain about required
and available knowledge.
6. A problem definition is moderately structured with normative agreement, the more
policy makers in a policy subsystem agree on norms and values at stake, and
the more they remain uncertain about required and available knowledge; policy
debates around the policy problem focus on effectiveness, efficiency and (the
distribution of) risks and other side effects.
7. A problem definition is moderately structured with knowledge certainty, the more
policy makers in the issue network disagree on the normative aspects and ethics
of the problem, and the more certainty they have on required and available
knowledge.
8. Working on public problems or problem processing involves problem structuring as
a central socio-cognitive process to bridge problem finding, framing, definition
and solving.
9. Problem structuring as a process depends on possible and plausible modes
of problem decomposition and the history of constraint sequencing; path
dependencies lead to the institutionalisation of problem definitions, or clusters
of problem definitions in issue or policy domains.
The second question in this set was: do different social cultures alive among the
citizenry align with different problem types and structures, and vice versa? It was
affirmatively argued that:
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10. Problem framings and definitions are used by proximate and authoritative
policy makers to mobilise political support among the masses and in civil
society through strategies of agenda setting and agenda denial for each other’s
favoured problem frames and definitions.
11. Policy makers with hierarchist cultural backgrounds exhibit the tendency to
frame and define policy problems as structured (focal or default strategy); they
will only have a weak tendency to frame and define problems as moderately
structured (in either of the two variations; secondary or fallback strategy);
and they will avoid framing and defining problems as unstructured.
12. Policy makers with isolationist or fatalist backgrounds will tend to frame and
define policy problems as unstructured; if forced, they will approach problem
framing and definition as maxmax-win or minmin-avoidance structured
problems.
13. Policy makers with enclavistic or broadly egalitarian backgrounds will
primarily frame or define policy problems as moderately structured problems
with knowledge certainty; they will be sympathetic to problem framings or
definitions as unstructured; if forced to structure them, they will be biased
in favour of framing and defining policy problems as moderately structured
with normative consensus on fair distribution of burdens and benefits.
14. Policy makers with individualist cultural backgrounds demonstrate strong
tendencies to define and frame policy problems as moderately structured
with normative agreement; they will be sympathetic to framing or defining
problems as structured if at all possible; and they will avoid any other type of
problem framings and definitions.
The third question was: do problem types or structures co-evolve with network
types? Findings could be listed in the following propositions:
15. Using network theory, four types of policy politics can be specified that tend
to generate the four types of policy problems, and vice versa, in a socially
reproductive process.
16. Normal regulatory policy in professional or technical communities tends to
reproduce structured problems; their policy politics may be characterised as
rule.
17. Normal advocacy coalition politics in well-institutionalised, oligopolistic
networks tend to reproduce moderately structured problems with normative
consensus; their style of policy politics is negotiation and (problem-driven)
search.
18. Transformative discourse coalition politics in designed and tightly managed
networks tend to work on moderately structured problems with value
ambiguity and antagonism, but knowledge certainty; their style of policy
politics is accommodationist and directed at conflict management.
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19. Open, emergent policy networks around unstructured, wicked problems have
mostly agonistic politics, crisis management, and (charismatic) leadership, or
a style of deliberation and learning.
20. In the real world, the types co-exist, overlap and co-evolve, giving politicians
and policy makers opportunities for combinations and shifts in efforts to
move away from unstructured problems, or to break up entrenched policy
communities and structured problems.
21. This can be done in forms of meta-governance, taking the shape of
interpolable balancing through venue creation, or policy and institutional
entrepreneurship and leadership.
Framing and design dynamics in the governance of problems
The first question in this set about framing and design dynamics was: what
epistemological changes or ‘drift’ may be observed in the development of policy
analysis since the 1950s to the present? The answer to this question is summarised
in the next propositions:
22. Generally, epistemological justification in policy analysis has moved from
instrumental rationality to types of fallibilist-pragmatist rationality, from
analycentrism to an argumentative turn – from ‘speaking truth to power’ to
‘making sense together’.
23. Policy analysis was originally dominated by technocratic aspirations and
instrumental rationality, expressing itself in analycentrism, neo-positivism
and critical rationalism as dominant paradigms.
24. Since the 1990s, a post-positivist, or argumentative or interpretive turn has
become equally strong, expressing itself in a ‘river delta’ of new paradigms:
relativism, critical theory, forensic (argumentative, deliberative) analysis, and
a participatory approach.
A second question was: is there a link, and if yes, to what extent, between styles of
doable policy analysis in the practice of policy work and these epistemological
debates in academic policy analysis? The answer found was:
25. There is evidence for the existence of a number of recurring core activities in
policy analysis: research and analysis, design and recommendation, strategic
advice, clarifications of values and arguments, democratisation, and mediation.
26 What actually happens is that analysts, in a pragmatic and context-dependent
way, and more or less successfully, make policy analysis doable as a mix of core
activities:
• a rational style, or research and analysis combined with recommendation
and advice;
• an argumentative style, or research and analysis while also clarifying values
and argument systems;
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The governance of problems
• a client advice style, mixing recommendation and advice on a policy
problem with strategic advice for a principal;
• a participatory style, introducing the critical clarification of values and
arguments into the democratisation of expertise;
• a process management style, linking up mediation and strategic advice;
and finally
• an interactive style, in which mediation for mutual understanding and
consensus building is linked to democratisation efforts.
27. Prescriptively, the styles of doable policy analysis may be turned into a reflective
heuristics for applying Dunn’s rule of methodological congruence, that is,
decisions on which style of policy analysis and its toolkit of concomitant
methods is appropriate given one’s perception and definition of the politicoadministrative environment and type of policy problem at hand.
Institutional questions for a governance of problems
The third and final set of questions pertained to polity-oriented, or institutional,
dimensions in the democratic and participatory governance of problems. Two
questions were posed. Is there a correspondence between problem structures
and types or styles of democracy? How is it possible to deal better with wrongproblem problems, especially with unstructured problems? Regarding the former
problem, three propositions were advanced:
28. The problem types appear to correspond to types of political arguments, along
the axes of degree of government intervention (high: fairness; low: market)
and degree of societal participation (high: participation; low: technical).
• political discourse on structured problems is characterised by strong
influences from both a technical and a market approach;
• on moderately structured problems with considerable normative agreement,
by a combination of arguments from a market and participatory approach;
• on moderately structured problems with considerable agreement on
knowledge and instruments, by a coalescence of the fairness and technical
approach;
• and, finally, on unstructured problems, by a synthesis of the participatory
and fairness approach.
29. This convergence between policy and political approaches also extends to
concepts of democracy:
• The rule approach to structured problems is compatible with a thin
procedural interpretation of democracy as a mechanism for the peaceful
circulation of elites under restricted popular influence.
• The negotiation-and-search approach to moderately structured problems
with normative consensus is compatible with standard accounts of liberal,
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pluralist democracy; either in interest group theories or corporatist
variations.
• The accommodation approach to moderately structured problems with
knowledge certainty appeals to an elite-cartel democracy.
• The learning approach to unstructured problems calls for participatorycum-deliberative modes of democracy.
30. The four different concepts of democracy, not separately but jointly, constitute
an adequate description of the working of democracy in practice; they
comprise inherently contradictory but constituent parts of the set of beliefs,
rules and procedures that are applied to the democratic governance of different
types of policy problems; they jointly constitute a meta-theory about the
maximisation of the intelligence of democracy in the governance of problems.
Regarding the question of how to deal better with the wrong-problem problem
and especially unstructured problems, a last set of propositions was advanced:
31. In political systems dominated by representative democracy, politicians and
proximate policy makers frame deliberative and participatory exercises as one
set of possibilities for themselves in a list of venues for issue framing, agenda
setting, policy formulation and policy evaluation.
32. Instead of a continuum from no to high citizen control, there appear to be
five fundamentally different and discontinuous modes of citizen participation:
• participation as consultation: to encourage comments on policy proposals;
participants’ views may, but need not necessarily, influence subsequent
formal policy formulation;
• participation as partnership: citizens, interest groups or civil society
associations give policy advice through ad-hoc or formal advisory boards;
sometimes followed by involvement in policy co-production, co-regulation
and (community) co-management of implementation schemes;
• participation as standing influence: through formal legal hearing and
administrative review procedures;
• participation as consumer choice: in service delivery citizens influence
product specification or preferred provider choice, for example through
client councils;
• participation as control: citizens make final decisions through referendums.
33. Different modes of participation are more compatible with different types
of problem structures:
• a rule approach to structure problems is compatible with standing or
consumer choice;
• a negotiation-and-search approach to moderately structured problems
with normative consensus is compatible to partnerships and consultation;
• an accommodation approach to moderately structured problems with
knowledge certainty is compatible with consultation, or partnership, or
standing.
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• a deliberative and/or participatory approach to unstructured problems is
compatible with partnership, or, given sufficient spaces for deliberation,
control.
34. In political systems with representative democracy, participatory and/or
deliberative modes of doable policy analysis run into persistent problems
in the input, throughput and output phase, largely because of motives and
mechanisms to do with proposition # 31.
This list of 34 propositions can be read as a succinct overview of the argument so
far.Yet, especially the last proposition, suggests that the three angles from which
the governance of problems was analysed – powering, puzzling and participation
– entail an important question not yet adequately dealt with.That question can be
formulated as: what is the relation between powering and puzzling? Participation
is either participation-in-puzzling or in powering; hence the question is limited
to only the first two P’s.
Asymmetry and polarity between puzzling and powering
Knowledge/puzzling and power/instigation
Ever since Francis Bacon, we suspect that knowledge is and generates power. Later,
others like Nietzsche and Foucault argued the other way around: power defines
knowledge, rather, defines what is to count as ‘rational’ knowledge of empirical or
normative ‘truth’. Given such widely diverging views, it is perhaps understandable
that in theory and research on policy, planning, management and organisation
the theme of their relationship is hardly addressed seriously.Yet, in view of some
of the conclusions reached here, it is compelling to reflect on the relationship
between knowledge or puzzling, and political interaction or powering in policy
analysis as the governance of problems.The very distinction between ‘policy’ and
‘politics’ is rooted in somehow keeping ‘puzzling’ or analysis and ‘powering’ or
politics apart in the governance of problems.
Like in the English language, the Dutch language has separate words for
politics (‘politiek’) and policy (‘beleid’). Somewhere in the beginning of the 20th
century, ‘beleid’ became a popular buzzword. Like the French playwright Molière’s
character who, to his own surprise, discovered he had been speaking prose all his
life, so the Dutch started to fancy ‘beleid’ or policy over ‘politiek’ or politics. Politics
acquired negative connotations like controversy, partisanship, manipulation and
opportunism. Policy, on the contrary, was bestowed all the positive connotations
of being businesslike, expert, objective and consensual (Van de Graaf and
Hoppe, 1996: 15-18). The ascendancy of the concept of policy over politics is
understandable from the double meaning of ‘beleid’ in the Dutch language – on
the one hand, leadership, and, on the other, prudence. These etymological roots
strongly suggest that those engaged in policy work were statespeople and experts
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of a certain prudence and wisdom, rather than mere politicians concerned with
the power games of sordid politics.
The result was that in everyday discourse politics came to be talked about more
and more as policy making, or a contest over policies. This was reflected even
in academic discourse, as in Wildavsky’s (1980) notion of policy making as both
intellectual cogitation and political interaction. Yet, this very notion reveals the
implicit paradox in the double meaning of ‘beleid’ or policy, namely the opposition
between reason and power, and between reflection and decisive action in politics.
In a short course on philosophy, German philosopher Karl Jaspers, mentor and
friend of Hannah Arendt, points out that this paradox inheres in the very nature
of politics (1974: 81): ‘Politics is oriented in reference to two opposites: potential
coercion and free association.… In their essential meaning, power politics and
deliberative politics are mutually exclusive; yet, in their conjunction is the practice
of politics, at least until this day and, as far as we can see, in the future.’
Truly reflexive governance is possible only in a well-articulated consciousness of
this paradox between ‘puzzling’ or deliberative politics and ‘powering’ or collective
will formation in power politics. This is even more necessary for a reflexive
governance of problems in democratic politics; especially if such governance desires
to create more opportunities and public spaces for deliberation and participation by
citizens and stakeholders. After all, such governance seeks to rebalance democratic
politics towards the pole of reason, deliberation and learning, and away from the
pole of power backed up by authority and potential coercion. The feasibility of
such an ambitious political project depends on one’s insights and beliefs about the
exact relationship between them.Therefore, it is imperative to dwell a bit longer
on the exact relationship between the elements of the paradox.
‘Knowledge’ was already discussed in Chapter Two. There it was argued that
it is a problematic and multifaceted concept. Knowledge is different from data
and information. Data are loose ‘bits’ like numbers, words, sounds and pictures.
When organised one way or another, they are the building blocks of information,
for example as texts, statistics, tapes or movies. Knowledge comes about when
intellects process, make sense of and give meaning to information. Rooney et
al (2003a: 3) say ‘we are better off not talking about knowledge (a noun) but
about giving meaning and developing understandings in the act of knowing (a
verb)’. Knowing is a complex, socially distributed activity that situates knowers in
relation to larger interpretive contexts and other knowers. Puzzling actually is what
knowers do when, in processing problems, they try to make sense of the particulars
of their actions and contexts by relating them to larger interpretive contexts.
Some may do this through religious faith in truthful life revealed to saints who
wrote holy books; others through their faith in the methods of science to arrive
at approximations of the truth as external, objective reality; and to organise bits
of articulated knowledge in so-called ‘universal’, or at least more-than-contextual
bodies of knowledge. The latter faith is more likely to be called rational. When
speaking about ‘puzzling’, these more rational forms of sense making in problem
processing are actually referred to. In puzzling, people communicate with each
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other through argumentation; they are persuaded to give up or advance positions
on claims based on the force of the best argument. In that sense, most treatises on
policy analysis are about rational puzzling on some collectivity’s behalf.
‘Powering’ was introduced and discussed in general terms in Chapter One.
Wrong (1979: 2) advanced a simple, yet effective definition of power as ‘the
capacity of some persons to produce intended and foreseen effects on others’ (see
also Giddens, 1984).This definition covers most modes of ‘power’ as distinguished
by political scientists – control over manifest decision making, control over agendasetting and non-decisions, and control over beliefs about needs and self-identity
(Lukes, 1974). The definition is compatible with the idea of dispositional power,
that is, people and organisations having more money, knowledge, personnel and
technologies may in principle (not always in actuality) mobilise more power.
The definition does not deny that the actual use of power is always structurally
embedded and thus constrained in historically and socially constructed institutions
and discourses. Yet, it stresses that people, even though in structurally ‘given’
situations and thus from starting positions that are not of their own making,
always actively strive to change power relations – sometimes successfully. The
definition also stresses both the enabling and constraining uses of power. As the
example of technology as power makes clear, especially for problem processing,
power is not a zero-sum game in which one person’s or group’s gain in power is
another’s loss. Although increases in power of some can weaken others, they need
not necessarily do so. Power always poses a threat to freedom. Nevertheless, it is
also necessary for freedom to assert and maintain itself.The ubiquitous character
of coalition-building behaviour in policy making should have opened power
analysts’ eyes to the intransitive or non-zero-sum character of power (Arts and
Van Tatenhove, 2004).
In problem processing, powering takes the form of mobilising the help of
others, that is, instigation, or ‘sparking off contributory actions in other persons’
(De Jouvenel, 1963: 8). This can be done amicably; as happens each time an
instigator approaches the instigandus as participant in a shared group to which
the instigandus feels attached and which (co-)determines their political identity
(for example, as member of the same political party, interest group, old-boys
network or fellow countryman). In all such cases, ‘powering’ means an appeal to
the instigandus’s confidence in the instigator and loyalty to him and the collective
he stands for; or ‘that capital feature of the “political animal”, the propensity to
comply’ (De Jouvenel, 1963: 73; there are excellent practical examples for the US
in Halperin, 1974; and for the European Union in Eppink, 2007). In other cases,
‘powering’ or instigation rests on credible threats, occasionally the actual use of
psychological or physical force. Only in a minority of cases, instigation rests on
legitimate hierarchy, in which the power holder has a legal or otherwise socially
acknowledged right to command, and the power subject an obligation to obey.
In powering, people communicate usually not through commands but by
influencing each other’s perception of the costs and benefits of commitment to a
particular action. This may be a very discursive or argumentative process. Yet, in
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argumentation as puzzling the illocutionary speech act, the internal power of the
argument (Pellizoni, 2001: 62), the ‘what’ of the argument is at stake, irrespective
of who argues to whom. In powering it is the perlocutionary speech act, not the
argument per se, but its external power (Pellizoni, 2001: 60), what one achieves
by arguing something, that is at stake. Usually this is the relationship between
the speaker and the listener, and the commitment of the listener to act upon the
instigator’s bidding. In more important cases, the inclusion or exclusion from the
circle of competent and eligible speakers and listeners itself is at stake.
It is precisely because, contrary to many easy distinctions, arguing plays a role
in both puzzling and powering that more reflection on their relationship is
unavoidable. Such reflection may take the form of arguments in favour of some
functional or principled primacy – of puzzling over powering, or the other way
around.
Primacy for puzzling?
One author explicitly arguing in favour of a primacy for puzzling is the German
political and policy scientist Thomas Saretzki. He examines and compares
argumentation and negotiation as modes of communication in politics and policy
making. His conclusion is that argumentation has a kind of communicative
primacy because there can be no negotiation without argumentation; yet, there
can be argumentation without negotiation (Saretzki, 1996: 36; also see Landwehr,
2009:110-128).
Stripping the concept from all thematic, contextual and actor role contingencies,
Saretzki describes argumentation as the mode of communication for the vindication
of claims of validity for empirical-theoretical and normative propositions. In case of
doubt about the validity of empirical-theoretical claims, criteria of factual evidence
and theoretical consistency are appealed to. In case of doubt about normative
claims, criteria of consistency and impartiality are decisive. Negotiation is described
as the mode of communication for the credibility of pragmatic, action-oriented
claims or demands. In case of doubt, one has to establish the credibility of the
negotiating parties.This may be done by examining the seriousness or flexibility
in which they represent their demands; and by examining their preparedness and
capability to really act on the promises, threats and exit options supporting their
demands.Thus, in case of argumentation, the result is determined by argumentative
power, or symbolic capital, or availability of good arguments; in negotiation, the
result depends on bargaining power or the availability of material or financial
resources and exit options (Saretzki, 1996: 33).
From a functional perspective, Saretzki argues, argumentation is a specialised
mode of communication for solving cognitive problems; negotiations have
this specialised function for distributive issues. The functional perspective has a
corresponding structural aspect, that is, argumentation is triadic, negotiation is
dyadic. In order to vindicate an empirical or normative validity claim, proponents
and opponents have to appeal to an external, ‘third’ institution – like scientific
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methods in the case of empirical truth; or values, principles and norms laid down
in constitutions, laws and treaties in the case of normative claims. In negotiation,
ideally, there is no recourse to an outside agency or third party. The acceptability of
practical claims is solely determined by the judgements of the negotiating parties
involved in reaching an agreement. Finally, the functional and structural relations
spill over to processual properties. Negotiation necessarily occurs sequentially,
whereas argumentation has a kind of reflexivity characterised by simultaneity in
the judgements about pattern or fit between parts and whole (Saretzki, 1996: 34).
On this basis, Saretzki observes a principled asymmetry between argumentation
and negotiation. They have fundamentally different meanings for cognitive
processes of problem finding and self-understanding, and they are not mutually
substitutable. Cognitive problems cannot be solved by negotiation – there is no
such thing as ‘negotiated (empirical) truth’, at least not in the end, and certainly not
as an adequate way of problem processing. Eventually, negotiated truths will lead
to the kind of structural mismatch between problems as experienced by problem
owners directly involved in problematic situations, and the problem representations
of the stronger parties in the negotiation. Vice versa, distributional issues may
successfully be tackled without negotiation, as long as people get agreement on
rules for distribution based on rationally legitimate principles of distribution and
their scope of application. In other words, by argumentation one may successfully
process both cognitive and distributional problems; yet, negotiation is functionally
limited to processing distributional problems only. That is why Saretzki concludes
that argumentation is elementary and multifunctional, whereas negotiations remain
a derived, functionally restricted mode of communication.
Primacy for powering?
Saretzki is not politically naïve; he admits that processes of argumentation
frequently, but not always, follow only after their scope and constraints have
been determined in previous negotiations: ‘Looked at from the beginning of the
communication process (as well as from the use of their results) factual primacy
lies with negotiation, not argumentation’ (Saretzki, 1996: 37). Yet, others argue,
not for a contingently historical, but for the law-like causal primacy of any type
of power over argumentation. This argument comes in a structural, and in a
constructivist or cognitive-psychological, version.
The first version is structural, that is, power and rationality mutually constitute
each other. Power defines the constraints for what is accepted as rationality and
truth, and accepted rationality and truth produce relations of power (Flyvbjerg,
1998: 225-36).1 This statement should be understood to mean two things. Stable
power relations generate a working consensus on rules that separate truth from
untruth and reality from ‘just storytelling’. Examples are to be found in political
systems with coalition governments, which use formally established scientific
advisory bodies or government-sponsored research and development institutes
to depoliticise political issues. The scientific bodies both produce politically
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‘unassailable’ facts for national governmental policy making, and simultaneously
pass scientific judgements on the economic cost-benefit ratio and uncertainty of
unwelcome political proposals launched by local governments, by the opposition,
or by non-governmental players.2 Thus, the maintenance of power also rests on
a particular interpretation of reality; interpretation is not just commentary or
judgement, but ‘a means of becoming master of something’ (Flyvbjerg, 1998:
117). In less stable power relations, any open confrontation will lead to rationality
being trumped by power. ‘Rationality’ actors – like policy analysts, or advisers or
alarmed scientists – are simply degraded by the ‘power’ actors – like politicians,
high-level administrators and interest group leaders – from valued discussion
partners to passive spectators and bystanders. This notion was particularly well
expressed in a comment by an aide of the Bush government to journalist Ron
Suskind (New York Times Magazine, 17 October 2004):
The aide said that guys like me were ‘in what we call the reality-based
community, … [who] believe that solutions emerge from … judicious
study of discernible reality.… That’s not the way the world really works
anymore…. We’re an empire now, and when we act, we create our
own reality. And while you’re studying that reality – judiciously, as
you will – we’ll act again, creating other new realities, which you can
study too, and that’s how things will sort out. We’re history’s actors ...
and you, all of you, will be left to just study what we do.
A second type of argument for the law-like primacy of powering over puzzling
is constructivist and rests on a radical interpretation of bounded rationality. It is
succinctly and precisely stated by Karl Jaspers: our inability to (fully) know implies
the unavoidability of our obligation to will. Lindblom (1968: 12) explicitly asked:
‘How far can we go in reasoning out policy instead of fighting over it?’ The
brief answer is ‘not very far’. Whether we see the boundedness of our rationality
and hence deliberative skills in the neurophysiologic make-up of the individual’s
cognitive (Simon, 1957) and affective apparatus (e.g. Janis and Mann, 1977;
Damasio, 2000); in the small group dynamics of group pressure or groupthink
(Janis, 1982); in the mental ‘cages’ of a bureaucratic way of organising specialised
knowledge and a division of labour (Forester, 1989); in the irresistible attraction
of the preferred worlds of the cultures we live by (Thompson et al, 1990); or, as
in philosophical anthropology and political philosophy, in the intersubjectivity,
finitude and historicality given by the human condition (Merleau-Ponty,
in Dauenhauer, 1986) – for us human beings reality is equally complex and
overwhelming.
Even apparently simple (policy) problems become hypercomplex after some
serious analysis and reflection. This not only pertains to ‘facts’ of the world.
Bounded rationality spills over, so to speak, in the world of values, ideals and
norms. As we tend to impute value to everything we observe and experience,
bounded rationality also affects our ability to fathom and systematically deal with
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The governance of problems
normative issues. Therefore, every plan or design, no matter how sophisticated
the process of its production, is just a latest fashion; it may never pretend to be a
last word. Logically, problems can be thought about, reasoned out and deliberated
about without end or closure. For political decisions and collective actions the
implication is that ‘who may define a problem for deliberation, and when?’ will
become an issue of power struggle. Moreover, the same logic implies that the
question of closure or ‘does it make sense to deliberate longer?’ similarly becomes
a power issue.The nature of collective, political problems obviously is such that no
self-evident ‘rational’ criteria can be formulated for starting up or closing down
processes of reasoning and deliberation about them.
Thus, our bounded rationality and deliberative skills, sooner or later, force
us to fall back on political instigations. On the way to collective actions, our
mental efforts in thinking and the speech acts in our deliberations run into
insurmountable complexities, normative ambivalences, dilemmas and inextricable
‘knots’. If only because there are matters, especially in the public domain, that
can be thought or openly said (like convincing a majority of the ingenious
compromise between contradictory values in a bill) but not practically done (as
any street-level bureaucrat can tell the lawmakers), and can be done (like being
corrupt, or making a political deal) but not publicly said (Brunsson, 1993). The
only way we know to deal with such ‘knots’ with a view to collective action, is
to ‘cut’ them. The first step in moving from reason and deliberation to action,
then, is to mobilise our will or volition and decide what to do – a word rooted
in the Latin verb ‘de-cidere’ which means to ‘cut off ’ or ‘cut through’. We have to
cut off reason and deliberation and come to a decision. It appears that, far from
a worn-out normative democratic cliché, the idea of a primacy of powering is
a cognitive-affective and socio-political construct that is a necessary condition
for bringing about collective action (see Williams, 1980: 5). Lindblom (1968)
therefore called policy analysis not neutral, but partisan analysis; not a way of
puzzling over policy, but an important method of fighting over it.
Note that in both the structural and cognitive-psychological versions of the
primacy of powering, asymmetries are constructed. In the structural account,
powering belongs to action and ‘history makers’; puzzling is denigrated as
a passive hindsight of spectators and jurors. In the cognitive-psychological
account, powering is for those happily engaging in the competition of political
will formation, and the political action in decision making; puzzling is for the
speculative of mind and the deliberative of inclination. In both accounts, a sort
of functional divide between practice versus theory, action versus spectatorship,
willing versus thinking, future-looking decision versus backward-looking
judgement is erected. Powering is for those who practice the art of politics and
know how politics works; puzzling is for those who like to know (in advance,
or after the fact) what politics is for, but not necessarily know how it works...
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Responsible and hopeful governance of problems
Not just asymmetry, but polarity
Next to asymmetry, there is another important aspect to the relationship between
powering and puzzling not yet treated satisfactorily. One could say that judgement
and instigation are condemned to each other. Most accurately, it is a polarity,
that is, a relationship of mutually dependent, but contradictory forces that in
their inextricable entwinement nevertheless should be seen and dealt with as
one phenomenon, as a single object of analysis and unit of action (see Schmidt
and Schischkoff, 1978: 529). Here, the focus is on the question of the mutual
dependence part of the polarity. The contradictory aspects have been treated in
the analysis of asymmetries; the entwinement aspect has been illuminated in the
structural account of the relationship between puzzling and powering as mutually
constituting a power/knowledge complex. This mutual dependency dimension
can be brought out best by going into to the limits of powering or collective will
formation in policy design.
Above, it was mentioned that Lindblom (1968) asked: how far could we go in
reasoning out policy instead of fighting over it? Here, the counterpart question
is asked: how far can we go in merely fighting over policy instead of reasoning it
out? Maybe this question has drawn less scholarly attention because the answer
is not flattering to scientists: ‘quite far, much further at least than through reason
and deliberation’. To investigate whether or not, and to what extent, instigation
or collective will formation depends on reason and deliberation, it helps to take
a more detailed look at what happens during instigation processes. Examining a
simple two-person instigation process will bring out all elements necessary for
answering the question (De Jouvenel, 1963: 69):
1. An instigator imagines a desirable future situation, and ways and means to
achieve this desirable state at some future time; these also comprise which
decisions and actions by other people will contribute to his goal achievement.3
2. The instigator communicates one other person (instigandus) what decision
they desire them to take, or which action to perform.
3. The instigandus interprets the instigator’s appeal; and subsequently complies
(on to 4) or refuses (back to 1).
4. The instigandus decides or acts as the instigator wishes.
The first step immediately shows why and to what extent instigation depends
on design, reason and deliberation. In the absence of any reasoning, the instigator
would not know what to desire of others, let alone who these others could be.
Availability of some rudimentary form of ratiocination is a necessary condition
for instigation.This is Saretzki’s argument of ‘primacy’ for puzzling or judgement,
arguing from a communicative functionality. However, it is a far from sufficient
condition.The dependence of instigation on some puzzling does not go beyond
the mere existence of design – good or bad, sophisticated or simple. Examining
steps 2 through 4 makes this abundantly clear.
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The governance of problems
De Jouvenel correctly emphasises that even if instigator and instigandus are
completely equal in influence and status, the temporal sequence grants initiative
to the instigator. This is a small, but potentially crucial advantage in exerting
influence. It is at the root of the many political science theories that stress the
importance of timing or ‘windows of opportunity’ in politics and policy making.
The advantage is hidden in the instigator’s possibility to bias the weight of motives
for the instigandus in his own favour. Motives are considered ‘substantive’ if the
instigandus’ response is not significantly affected by the instigator’s identity. As
explained above, depending on his personality and the circumstances of the
instigation, every instigandus will have to balance the ‘what’ and the ‘by whom’ of
an instigation.This means that every instigator, by seizing the initiative, in principle,
has an opportunity to frame or stage the instigation in ways that maximise the
probability that ‘by whom’ motives prevail.
This largely explains why, in politics and policy making, instigation carries
one further by a long shot than mere reason and deliberation. Although focused
instigation requires one to have some plan or design in mind, its substance does
not necessarily play a significant role in the instigation’s success.
No policy comes about without reason and deliberation on the one hand,
and instigation or power on the other; but the nature of their being necessary is
very different. For their adoption and implementation, even high-quality policy
designs remain vitally dependent on successful instigation and decision making.
Nevertheless, designs soon hit upon insuperable limits to rationality, irrespective
of whether they were reasoned out with or without much sophistication, and
with or without extensive deliberation processes. On the way to collective action,
these limits can only be overcome by falling back on instigations and decisions.
Wishing powering away in advocacy of a power-free, deliberative politics is
utopian (Pellizoni, 2001). Contrasting a scientific ideal of politics with the ideal
of a self-regulating society, Lindblom (1990: 221-2) states:
The science model frets about power and imposition…. The selfguiding society displays much less hostility to power … and probes how
to distribute power or the capacity to impose in an appropriate way
rather than entertain hopes, inevitably to be frustrated, of minimising
its use.
Power, influence, sometimes coercion – these activities require some design; but
after taking this relatively simple hurdle, there are no further limits that literally
force them to revert to reasoning and deliberation. Having a plan – not: having
a reasonably good, ethically acceptable plan – is just one necessary, possibly
favourable, but my no means sufficient condition for successful instigations.
Now, if one feels that politicians and policy makers get too far in merely fighting
over and imposing policy instead of reasoning it out, one draws an ethical line.
I believe that this boundary ought to be drawn where conscious, deliberate and
transparent public transference of administrative and political competencies and
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Responsible and hopeful governance of problems
responsibilities degenerates into (mass-)psychological, private and non-transparent,
therefore democratically uncontrollable phenomena of social transference.
These are situations where political leadership, instead of being constrained by
legal rules and authority, becomes merely charismatic and totalising; or where
political accountability is organised away in complex procedures and bureaucratic
nightmares (Bauman, 1989). In these conditions, public morality withers away
to such an extent that large numbers of politicians, administrators, civil servants
and citizens too, manifest what Arendt (1979: 4) saw as typical for Eichmann: ‘a
manifest shallowness in the doer that made it impossible to trace the incontestable
evil of his deeds to any deeper roots or motives.… [I]t was not stupidity, but
thoughtlessness’.
Conditions for a responsible and hopeful governance of
problems
If it is utopian to think of a power-free politics, if the hope to minimise the abuse
of power and coercion is inevitably frustrated, how is it possible to realistically
believe in the possibility of a policy analysis in the service of more deliberative
spaces and designs in political systems with representative democracy? Why not
be realistic and practise political satisficing about representative democracy in
capitalist societies? Why not admit that representative democracy in its present
functioning is the least bad system? Why not firmly believe that one has nothing
to gain from an attempt to convert the increased veto and nuisance powers of civil
society and ordinary citizens (see Chapter One) into positive contributions to
deliberations for politically organised solidarity in shared projects and a common
cause (see Chapter Nine)?
In the opening section of this book, it was argued that politics is intrinsically
paradoxical. On the one hand, political organisation unifies a society’s members
in a common effort to bring about goods, services and performances that benefit
all or most. On the other hand, the logics of power and division of labour divide
society’s members in groups at varying distances from the discretion and power
of taking authoritative political decisions.Yet, if politics springs from humankind’s
nature as a responsible being in dialogue with others, then a responsible politics
aims to subordinate the dividing feature to the unifying feature.Why not attempt
to exploit the contextually distributed knowledges, discourses and action potentials
for more intelligent, socially acceptable and contextually robust, shared plans and
projects? The audacious attitude that best promotes a responsible practice of politics
is one of a properly conceived hope, that is, not hope and pray, but hope as a
deliberately adopted attitude towards acting in concert with others (Dauenhauer,
1986; Obama, 2006). It means that one cannot give up on constantly finding new
ways to align productive puzzling to non-crippling ways of powering. In our
complex societies, processes of division of labour and specialisation of knowledge
will continue to produce divergent, contrasting rationalities and accompanying
discourses, alienation, and huge power differentials. Still, one cannot give up on
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The governance of problems
efforts to manage situations of domination and subordination in such ways that
productive mutual recognition of roles between distant and more proximate
policy makers is still possible:
Exercises of power can and should aim to transform the relationship
between power holders and power subjects from being a relationship
of subordination into one of coordination, of reciprocal power sharing.
Performances of the ‘power holder’ are legitimate only if they are
compatible with the eliciting of genuine initiative from the ‘power
subject’.… Within the political domain, practitioners of a politics of hope
must constantly seek to bring new members into the ranks of political actors.’
(Dauenhauer, 1986: 144, emphasis added)
In a responsible and hopeful governance of problems, there appear to be at least
three routes to achieve this aim. Public policy, like all human striving, is caught in
the precarious position of both trying to understand society and simultaneously
shape it.Therefore, the art and craft of policy analysis is about linking knowledge
to action, through evidence and reason, in a context of political power. One way
to avoid and actively resist a politics of resignation to power is to organise degrees
of alternation or oscillation between powering and puzzling in clever process
management of single projects or exercises in policy design and implementation
(Hoppe, 1983; Van de Graaf and Hoppe, 1996; Hoppe et al, 1998). This is why
it makes sense to keep studying the ways in which organisers of mini-public
deliberative and participatory exercises in policy design handle the perplexities
of such processes. However, it is of equal importance to study the balancing and
oscillation between powering and puzzling in ‘ordinary’ policy making inside
bureaucratic agencies and in the multilevel networks of ‘normal’ policy making.
The second route is to keep striving for institutional alignment through
interpolable balancing in network governance (see Chapters Six, Eight and Nine):
‘A responsible politics … recognizes that no institution can be perfect, that every
institution is finite and conditioned by historical circumstances – both material
and cultural – in which it operates.… [A]ll institutions, political and otherwise,
are always in need of reform’ (Dauenhauer, 1986: 139). Reflexive network
governance, however, requires a space where this reflexivity may be exercised.
Preservation of such a space is at the heart of political democracy; and thus
requires an autonomous political institutional domain. Particularly, this political
domain will not allow political institutions to be dominated by other institutional
spheres – neither religious theocracy, nor scientific technocracy, nor the market
system’s econocracy. During the last decades, most attention has been given to
religious and technocratic threats to the autonomy of politics, with technocracy
usually invoked against theocratic tendencies – and vice versa. After the recent
financial and economic crisis it is high time to roll back the encroachment of
market system rules and practices on politics (Lindblom, 2001).This is not a licence
to politicise other institutional spheres of social and private life. A responsible
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Responsible and hopeful governance of problems
politics will preserve the autonomy of the other spheres and remain permeable
to their criticism and influence. A reflexive and responsible political governance
of problems requires sufficient room for opposition – if necessary, facilitating
such opposition.
A third way to keep the dilemmas, perplexities and ironies of puzzling versus
powering within the bounds of the politically manageable, is to be alert to the
conditions that indicate a responsible exercise of power and coercion.A responsible
governance of problems foremost implies restraints of all participants. On the
side of ‘power holders’, that is, authoritative decision makers and their staffs of
policy workers and the circle of influential, proximate policy makers, restraint
in the use of power and coercion means eliciting genuine initiatives by ‘power
subjects’, and use of these inputs in the co-design of positive programmes for
responding to citizens’ needs, wants, and problems (Dauenhauer, 1986: 159-60).
It means taking the first two routes, as indicated above, seriously. In addition, it
means tangible efforts to lift impairments on citizen probing (Lindblom, 1990)
by means of better citizen and science education; and, probably, fighting excessive
misinformation in business reporting and advertising, and especially abuse of trust
by business and private people in internet communication.
Restraints also apply to the side of the ‘power subjects’. No responsible citizen
can give unqualified priority to their own or their group’s wants and needs.
There is an obligation to listen to one another and to policy makers and political
decision makers. Only if it is beyond reasonable doubt that mutual deliberation is
impossible, or if proximate and authoritative policy makers cannot be convinced
of tackling very serious wrong-problem problems, antagonistic politics that use all
sorts of political protest and civil disobedience come into view. In a responsible
governance of problems there is one very difficult-to-handle sort of constraint.
On the one hand, a democratic governance of problems is rooted in a Socratic
attitude to the question-and-answer game. Galvanising questions and awarenessraising answers nurture and direct the process of coming to prudential political
judgements and action commitments. In the political question-and-answer game,
citizens have the right and obligation to question power. On the other hand,
uninhibited questioning or scepticism undermines the learning process. Although
policies easily evolve into dogma for policy makers and decision makers, without
considering certain issues fixed and taking certain practices temporarily for
granted, serious debate and learning would come to a halt through overburdening
the problem-processing capacities of individuals and the political system alike.
Balancing dogma versus scepticism, then, is another important restraint in the
responsible governance of problems (Wildavsky, 1980 [1979]: 16, 18-19).
The art and craft of policy analysis is about linking knowledge to action, through
evidence and reason, in a context of political power. Under such conditions,
policy analysts can adopt several basic attitudes to their own jobs. One attitude
is succumbing to a politics of will, by developing ways and means for furthering
plebiscitary and e-democracy. Modern information technology is harnessed to
the revivification of the old myth of popular sovereignty. Another manifestation
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The governance of problems
of bowing to political will formation is an absolute loyalty to political leaders.
Policy analysts adopting this attitude become lawyers and advocates.Another basic
attitude is to embrace a politics of vision, by giving more scope to autonomous
bureaucratic agencies, independent oversight bodies, and expert advice. The
volatility of the electoral cycle and political volition should be counterbalanced
by locating power in people of vision – policy analysts among them.
In this book, a governance of problems is preferred that adopts responsible hope
as its basic attitude. Power and coercion, rejection of mutual learning between
rulers and ruled through deliberation and argumentation, sophisticated answers
to wrong-problem problems – they all are certainly here to stay. A responsible
governance of problems therefore allows and furthers policy analysis in the face
of power. A hopeful governance of problems assumes and actively pursues that
dedicated analysts and clever citizens always, sooner or later, find ways to inject
solid puzzling in biased powering. Shrewd process management of policy projects,
wise institutional alignment in network governance, and a restrained use of power
and coercion lead to creative and collectively productive governance of problems.
Notes
One is reminded here of the joke about the Indians and the meteorologists. Uncertain
about whether or not to gather more wood for a long, harsh winter, the Indians’ chief
decides to telephone the meteorologist service for a scientific prediction. Convinced that
Indian folk wisdom frequently is a better predictor than their data and scientific models,
the meteorologists on their mountain top see the Indians downhill busily gathering wood,
and thus tell their chief that winter will be harsh and long.
1
Paradoxically, and testimony to the opportunism of contemporary mode-2 science,
powerful corporations, such as in the tobacco, pharmaceutical and food industries, support
and finance scientific research institutes that make it their business to exploit uncertainties
in the research of their colleagues to help industry undermine political regulatory initiatives
(Nestle, 2002; Michaels and Monforton, 2005; Michaels, 2008).
2
3. See Halperin, 1974, for many enlightening examples of bureau-political tactics in getting
the president’s ear from the US Departments of Defence and Foreign Affairs; and Eppink,
2007, for high-level bureaucrats working for the European Commission.
262
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Index
Index
Page references for notes are followed by n
A
Aalborg Project 26–7
acceptability heuristic 72, 245
accommodation 140–2, 158–62, 246, 249
Wadden Sea case 197
action strategies 97
actor configuration 132
administrative man 125
advise strategically 185, 187
advocacy coalitions 137–9, 144n, 246
drug policy 154–7
Volgermeer Polder 152–3
agonistic policy networks see open policy
networks
AIDS 66–7, 79–85
enclavists 111–12
individualists 113, 114–15
Allison, G.T. 123, 124, 128
analycentrism 175
Andersen, S.S. 198
Anderson, J.L. 64–5
answering see problem solving
Arendt, Hannah 7, 34, 117–18, 259
argumentation 186, 253–4
argumentative style of policy analysis
190–1, 247
asylum seekers 5
Australia
asylum seekers 5
gun control 109
B
Bacon, Francis 250
Baldwin, P. 66, 81–2, 83, 84, 85, 112
Bang, H.P. 38, 224
bargaining 74, 127, 128, 139, 143n, 154
Barros Luco, Ramòn 106
Bauman, Z. 35, 259
Baumgartner, F.R. 164–5
Beck, U. 35, 36
beleid 250–1
Belgium 39
Bentham, Jeremy 112
Berger, P.L. 24
Bernstein, Richard 171
Betuwe-line Project 26
Blair, Tony 3, 23, 31
Blommaert, J. 39
Bloomberg, Michael 143n
Bogason, P. 123
Bolognesi, D.P. 80
Boom, H. 26
Börzel, T. 130
Bosso, C.J. 91, 92
Boulding, Kenneth 119n
bounded rationality 71, 101, 125, 255–6
Bourdieu, P. 96
Braman, D. 93, 141
Braybrooke, D. 24, 113, 176
Brecht, Arnold 119n, 205
bricolage 165, 181, 196, 212, 219
Britain see UK
bureaucracy 69
Burns, T. 198
C
Cabinet Office (UK) 3, 26
calculated risk 136
calculating citizens 203
California 105
Campbell, D.T. 175–6, 177
car mobility 74
enclavists 111
hierarchists 104–5, 119n
individualists 115
isolates 107–8
Carson, Rachel 135
Castells, M. 36, 130
Catlaw, T.J. 60
Chisholm, D. 25
Christensen, T. 204
citizen participation see participation
citizenship
fairness approach to problem solving 204
market approach to problem solving 201
monitorial 216, 240n
participation approach to problem solving
210
technical approach to problem solving
199–200
civil aviation 92, 110
civil society 13–14, 29, 91
clarify values and arguments 185, 186
client advice style of policy analysis 190,
191, 248
client politics 62, 63
closed policy networks 131–4
293
The governance of problems
prenatal screening 149–50
Cobb, R.W. 61, 93–4
coercion 62
cogitation 123–4, 251
Cohen, D.K. 59, 177
Cohen, M.D. 124, 128
Colebatch, H.K. 24, 48, 184
collaborative forums 230–1
collective public health approach 82
communism 12–13
complementarity 221
compromising 127
computation 127, 128
congruence principle 129–30, 193, 248
Connolly, W.E. 229
constituent policies 62
constructivism see social construction
consultation 249
consumer choice 249
contingency theory 127–9
control 249, 250
coping 71,105, 115, 132, 219
corporations 13
cosmopolitans 210
Coughlin, J.F. 119n
critical theory 179–81, 182–3
critical-rationalism 175–6, 182
strengths and weaknesses 176–7
Crupi, J.A. 129
Cuban missile crisis 128
CUDO 169
cultural biases 96, 115–18
cultural dynamics 97–8
cultural theory
problem structuring 100–15
and spaces for public discourse 98–100
types 94–5
cybernetics 21n
D
Dahl, Robert 126–7, 199, 230
Dalton, Russell 40–1, 42
Dauenhauer, Bernard 7, 8, 145, 215, 260
De Jouvenel, Bertrand 7, 9, 60, 252, 257–8
decaying issue policy networks see open
policy networks
decision 256
as iceberg 25
decision making 123ff
decision strategies 124–6
towards contingency 126–9
decisionism 69
decomposability 102, 119n
deferential citizens 200
degree of certainty 245
degree of consensus 245
294
DeLeon, P. 127–8
deliberation 208–11
mini-public project 232–40, 241n
models 226–32
deliberative proceduralists 192
democracies of problems 196, 198, 211
fairness approach 204–7
market approach 201–3
participation approach 207–11
technical approach 198–200
democracy 195–6
concepts 248–9
frame shifts and network management
196–8
as governance of problems 3–5
intelligence of 6, 196, 213, 249
meta-theory 211–13
network governance 223–4
postparliamentary and postnational 170
pragmatic reflexive policy analysis 185,
187
Democrats ’66 36, 58n
Denmark
Aalborg Project 26–7
consensus conference model 226, 240n
design and recommend 185, 186
design dynamics 55–7, 244, 247–8
designed policy networks 132, 139–42
prenatal screening 148–9
Diesing, Paul 57
DiMaggio, P. 165
discourse coalitions 139–42, 144n, 246
discourse sequencing 141
discursive space 98–100
disharmony 8–9
distributive policies 62
distrust 38–9
doable policy analysis 247–8
Douglas, Mary 95, 97, 98
Dowding, K. 130
dramaturgical incrementalism 136–7
Dror,Y. 105–6, 107, 123, 174
drugs policy 154–7, 163, 164, 197–8
Dryzek, J.S. 179, 181, 231, 238, 239
Dunn, William 24–5, 27, 43, 47–8, 55–6,
129, 169, 176–7, 193, 248
E
Eckstein, Harry 93, 96
ecological rationality 71
economic liberalism 12
Edelman, Murray 239
egalitarianism 99
Ellis, Richard 95
emerging policy networks see open policy
networks
Index
enclavists 100, 109–12, 116, 120n
ends see moderately structured problems
(ends)
enlarged groupthink 109–10
enlightenment 132, 135
Enlightenment 171, 172
entrepreneurial politics 62–3
Epictetus 59
erotetic rationality 25
European Union 29
experiential knowledge 54, 167
expressive overdetermination 141
Ezrahi,Y. 68–9, 205
F
fact-value distinction 68–70
fairness approach to problem solving
basic theoretical claims 204–6
and democracy in practice 206–7
problem types and political theories
211–12
faith 119n
fallibilism 172
Finer, Sam 10–11
Fischer, F. 52, 60, 68, 119n, 143n, 175, 181,
182, 184, 199
Flyvbjerg, B. 26–7, 87
forensic analysis 181–2, 183
Forester, J. 179, 180
formal control 229, 230
Fortuyn, Pim 32
Foucault, Michel 35–6, 37, 38, 250
Fox, C.J. 180
frames 27, 30
see also problem framing
framing dynamics 54–5, 244, 247–8
and design dynamics 56
freedom 7
Friedman, Milton 33
Friesland 38–9
Fung, A. 230–1
Funtowicz, S.O. 172–3
fusion of horizons 236, 237
G
Gaebler, T. 38
Gallo, R.C. 80
garbage-can model 124, 128
Germany
AIDS 83, 85
open policy networks 135
Giddens, Anthony 11, 36, 145
Gigerenzer, G. 127
globalisation 2, 37
Goldstein, W.M. 71
Goodin, R.E. 231, 238, 239
governance 10–14, 21n
complexity, variety and fragmentation
13–15
retreat to the market 11–13
self-regulatory society 11–13
state penetration of life-worlds 10–11
governance of problems 19, 29–30, 43–4,
243–4
approach 6–7
conceptual model 46–50
and democracy 3–5, 195–6
framing and design dynamics 247–8
institutional questions 248–50
mapping 50–8
people as problem processors 1–2
problem structuring 15–17
puzzling, powering and participation
17–19
responsible and hopeful 259–62
responsive 2–3
translation dynamics 52–3, 245–7
see also meta-governance of problems
government 2–3
democracy in an age of distrust 38–9
dilemma 31–3
influencing problem structuring 39–42
problem-solving bias 26–7
ramification of Paris-1968 35–6
retreat of 37–8
welfare state 33–5
Grandori, A. 125, 129
Greed-Efficiency-Fairness (GEF) hypothesis
213n
Greenberg, G.D. 63
Grendstad, G. 94
grid 95
grid-group cultural theory 94–100
and problem-structuring 115–18
group 95
Pattern A 131–2
Pattern B 134
groupthink enlarged 109–10
guardians 199
gun control
designed policy networks 141
hierarchists 104, 119n
individualists 114
isolates 108–9
open policy networks 143n
Gusfield, Joseph 93–4, 117
295
The governance of problems
H
Habermas, Jürgen 11, 171–2, 175, 179–80
Hajer, M.A. 38
Hall, T.A. 123
Hammond, K.R. 71
Hayes, M.T. 136, 144n
healthcare 217–20
Helderman, J.K. 222
hermeneutics 179
Hermes 116, 118
Hickson, D.J. 128
hierarchists 100–5, 116, 118n, 119n
hierarchy 99, 221
Hisschemöller, M. 27, 43, 88n, 179, 198,
225–6
Hobbes, Thomas 201
Hogarth, R.M. 71
homo respondens 7, 244
Hood, Christopher 38, 95
Hooghe, M. 41
Hoppe, R. 27, 43, 128, 179, 189, 192
Horowitz, Irving 81
Howlett, M. 121, 123, 196–7
Husted, B. 128
I
identity vouching 141
ill-structuredness 88n
image-of-man-assumptions 7, 8, 244, 245
incrementalism 125–7, 136–7
disjointed 125
dramaturgical 136
individualised public health approach 82–3
individualism 36, 98–9
individualists 100, 112–15, 116, 120n
Ingram, H. 32–3, 64, 65
inspiration 127, 128
instigation 252, 257–8
institutional alignment 14
institutional design 139–42
institutional entrepreneurship 165
institutional questions 244, 248–50
institutionalised networks see closed policy
networks; oligopolistic policy networks
instrumental rationality 174
interaction 123–4
interactive style of policy analysis 190, 192,
248
interest group politics 63
interest group theory 201
interpolable balancing 220–3, 240, 243,
247, 260
interpretive-relational contexts 54
interpretivism 171–2, 179
Iraq war 5
296
irrational citizenship 199–200
isolates 100, 105–9, 116
issue specialists 189–90
issue typologies 61–2, 87n
neo-positivist and social-constructivist
criticism 63–6
J
Janis, I.L. 71
Jaspers, Karl 7, 251, 255
Jenkins-Smith, H. 138
joint fact-finding 227–8
Jones, B.D. 164–5
judgement 127, 128
K
Kahan, D.M. 93, 141
King, P.J. 164
Kingdon, J.W. 123, 128, 164
Klijn, E.-H. 123
Klinkers, Leo 26
knowledge 54–5, 65–6
actor 132
closed policy networks 133
instrumental to fallibilist-pragmatist
rationality 171–3, 247
open policy networks 135–6
in and of policy 168–9
policy design 167
policy politics 122
and power 250–3
knowledge centres 230, 231
Kok, Wim 31–2
Kooiman, J. 14
Krieger, M.H. 67
Kriesi, H. 224, 240–1n
Kübler, D. 155, 157
L
Laegreid, P. 204
Lakoff, G. 118n
Lasswell, Harold 6, 15, 123, 168, 169,
173–4, 211, 244
leadership 124–5, 126
leadership and learning 142, 162
learning
analysis instruction 133, 215
instrument 138
policy-oriented 133, 145ff
second-order 138
synthetic 136, 139
types of 132
variety/selection 135, 137, 139, 215
learning about action 236
Index
learning approach 247, 249, 250
Lerner, D. 6, 169
life politics 36
Lijphart, A. 206
Lijst Pim Fortuyn (LPF) 32
Lindblom, Charles 59, 176, 177, 243
design dynamics 56
disjointed incrementalism 124, 125–7,
128, 194n
governance of problems 1–2
improved probing 14–15
individualists 113
market system 12, 205
proximate policy makers 28, 40
puzzling and powering 255, 256, 257, 258
relativism 178–9
Lipset, Martin 199
Lobstein, T. 193
Lockhart, Chris 95
Loeber, A. 232, 235–6, 241n
Lowi, T.J. 62, 63, 64–5, 87n, 122
Luckmann, T. 24
Lyotard, J.-F. 35
M
M-PDPs see mini-public deliberative
projects
macro politics 121–2, 164
Majone, G. 51
majoritarian politics 63
making sense together 167–8
Mann, Jonathan 111
Mann, L. 71
Mansbridge, J.J. 139
March, J.G. 106–7, 120n, 123, 124
market approach to problem solving
basic theoretical claims 201–3
and democracy in practice 203
and fairness approach 204, 205
problem types and political theories
211–12
market system 1, 11–13
Matthews, T.J. 80
Mayer, I. 184–94
Mbeki, Thabo 81, 111
McCool, D.C. 62
means see moderately structured problems
(means)
mediate 185, 188
Meijer, S. 147, 149, 150
Merleau-Ponty, Maurice 7, 243
meta-governance of problems 145, 165–6,
219, 239–40
constraints on pluralism 223–6
interpolable balancing 220–3, 243, 247
models of participation and deliberation
226–32
methodological congruence 129–30, 193,
248
Metze, M. 26
Meyer, J.W. 130
Miller, A. 127
Miller, H.T. 180
mini-people 230
mini-public 230
mini-public deliberative projects 232, 233,
260
input problems 232–5
output and outcome problems 237–9
throughput problems 235–7
Mintzberg, H. 123, 128
moderately structured problems (ends)
74–5
AIDS 80–1
and democracy 211, 212
enclavists 111
hierarchists 105
individualists 114, 116
isolates 107
negotiation-and-search approach 248–9
oligopolistic policy networks 246
participation 226, 227–8, 249
and political theories 211, 212, 248
problem-structuring trajectories 162
styles of policy analysis 194
and Thompson and Tuden typology 128
translation dynamics 245
moderately structured problems (means)
74–5
accommodation approach 249
AIDS 81
and democracy 211, 212
designed policy networks 246
enclavists 110–11, 116
hierarchists 105
individualists 114
isolates 107
participation 226, 228, 249
and political theories 211, 212, 248
problem-structuring trajectories 162
styles of policy analysis 194
and Thompson and Tuden typology 128
translation dynamics 245
Modernising government (Cabinet Office) 3,
26
modernity 33–5
monitorial citizenship 216, 240n
Monnikhof, R.A.H. 225
Montagnier, L. 80
morality policy 74–5
297
The governance of problems
Moran, M. 184
Motivaction 99
N
negative democracy 42
negotiation 253–4
negotiation and search 142, 162, 246,
248–9
neo-positivism 63, 175
Netherlands
abortion 74
advocacy coalitions 144n
AIDS 83
Betuwe-line Project 26
citizenship styles 199–200, 203
Democrats ’66 36, 58n
designed policy networks 140–1
discursive space 98, 99
fairness approach to problem solving
206–7
flooding and dike improvement 110–11
Friesland 38–9
healthcare 217–20
immigrant immigration 108
Iraq war 5
mini-public deliberative projects 233, 239
new politics 31–2
open policy networks 134
participation 227
politics and policy 250–1
prenatal screening 146–50, 162–3, 164,
197
Rathenau Institute 230–1
Schiphol Airport 92, 110
traffic jams 108
Volgermeer Polder 150–3, 163, 164, 197
Wadden Sea 158–62, 163, 164, 166n, 197
network governance 223–4
networks see policy networks
new conservatives 210
New Public Management 38, 223, 225–6
participation 227
Nietzsche, Friedrich 250
non-decisions 136, 143–4n
prenatal screening 146–7
NRC.next 36
Nutt, Paul 128, 129
O
Obama, Barack 240n
objective technicians 189–90
oligopolistic policy networks 132, 137–9,
246
Olsen, J.P. 38, 106–7, 120n, 123, 124
Olson, M. 201
298
open policy networks 132, 134–7, 247
prenatal screening 146–7
opinion polling 40
organised modernity 34
Osborne, D. 38
Ostrom, E. 202, 209
O’Toole, L.J., Jr. 14, 123
P
Papadopoulos,Y. 198, 231–2
Paparone, C.R. 129
Pareto optimum 120n
Paris-1968 35–6
Parsons, Wayne 46, 47, 123
participation 14–15, 17, 18–19, 30, 216–17
alternative forms 44–5
downward trend 44
governance of problems 244
modes 226–32, 249–50
newer forms 41
and problem structuring 28–9, 39–42
participation approach to problem solving
basic theoretical claims 207–8
and democracy in practice 209–11
problem types and political theories
211–12
participation in social coordination 14
participatory style of policy analysis 182–4,
190, 192, 248
partnering state 38
partnership 249, 250
Peters, B.G. 53
PLACE 169
Plato 10, 24
pluralism 223–6
polarity 257–9
policy
beleid 250–1
and knowledge 168–9
and politics 250–1
as social construction of meaning 48
as structured interaction 48
policy analysis 167–8, 243, 247–8
analycentrism to the argumentative turn
173–84
doable 117, 168
implications 15–19
and knowledge construction 55
pragmatic and reflexive 184–94
policy communities 131–4, 246
policy designs
knowledge context 167
as strategic problem-solving couplings
50–2
policy entrepreneurs 164–6
policy failure 32–3
Index
policy making
history of theory 123–30
models 46–8
profane model 49
sacred model 48–9
social construction 49–50
types of 132
policy networks 121, 130–1, 132, 246–7
closed 131–4
designed 132, 139–42
management 196–8
oligopolistic 132, 137–9
open 132, 134–7
and policy politics 142–3
prenatal screening 146–7, 148–50
problem-structuring dynamics 145
policy philosopher 190–1
policy politics 52, 121–2, 164
and problem structure typology 142–3
see also policy networks
policy problems see problems
policy-oriented learning 133
political participation see participation
political rationality 57
politics 1, 2, 57–8, 259
as governance of problems 3–5
new 31–2
participation 28–9
and policy 250–1
and policy science 173–4
as powering 8–9
primacy 223, 224–5
problem-solving bias 26–7
and public policy 61–3
as puzzling 7–8
and science 169–70, 174
see also macro politics; policy politics
politics of hope and prudence 58
politics of meaning 59–60
social and political analysis 61–3
social-constructivist approach 59–61
politics of realism or resignation 58
politics of vision 57, 240, 262
politics of will 57, 261
polity-oriented approach 57, 243
Popper, K.R. 175, 176
post-positivism 177–8, 247
critical theory 179–81
forensic analysis 181–2
participatory approach 182–4
relativism 178–9
postmaterialists 210
postnational democracy 170
postnormal policy analysts 192
postnormal science 172–3
postparliamentary democracy 170
power 10–11, 28, 252
enclavists 111
and knowledge 250
rationality 87
powering 17, 18, 30
politics 8–9, 15
primacy over puzzling 254–6
primacy of puzzling 253–4
and probing 207
and puzzling 57–8, 250–3, 257–9
practitioners’ knowledge 54, 167
pragmatic reflexive policy analysis 184–94
Pralle, S.B. 164
prenatal screening 146–50, 162–3, 164, 197
primacy
for puzzling 253
for powering 254
probing 15, 207
problem categorisation see problem framing
problem choice 31, 117
problem claims processing 50
problem definition 31, 117, 246
problem diagnosis see problem structuring
problem finding 4, 23, 24–5, 27, 30, 43, 244
ambivalence by governments 26
problem framing 27–8, 30, 64
civil aviation expansion 92
translation dynamics 246
see also framing dynamics
problem identification see problem finding
problem processing 1–2, 30, 43
bounded rationality 71
ecological rationality 71
problem framing 28
and problem structuring 245
social rationality 71–2
problem representation see problem framing
problem sensing see problem finding
problem solving 4, 23–4, 27, 31, 43, 244
bias in politics and administration 26–7
problem structuring 15–17, 23, 29–31,
42–4, 145, 162–3
concept 27–8
cultural roots 92–4
democratic experiments 232–9
drug policy 154–7, 163, 164
and grid-group cultural theory 115–18
influencing 39–42
and participation 28–9
and policy politics 142–3
prenatal screening 146–50, 162–3, 164
problem finding and problem solving
23–5
problem-solving bias 26–7
reflexivity 5–6
research themes 44–6
299
The governance of problems
towards a systematic culturalist theory
100–15
translation dynamics 245
Volgermeer Polder 150–3, 163, 164
Wadden Sea 158–62, 163, 164, 166n
problem-solution couplings 52, 78
problems 30
as social constructions and claims 66–70
social and political analysis 61–3
typology 70–6, 88n, 127–8
process management style of policy analysis
190, 191–2, 248
profane model 49
professional knowledge 54–5
public policy see policy
public policy problems see problems
puzzling 17–18, 30
politics 7–8, 15
and powering 57–8, 250–3, 257–9
primacy over powering 253–4
primacy of powering 254–6
problem structuring 27
Q
questioning see problem finding
Quinn, J.B. 128
R
Raiffa, H. 86
Ramesh, M. 123
random decisions 136
Rastogi, P.N. 101, 102–3, 119n
rational choice theory 201–3
rational style of policy analysis 189–90, 247
rationality 24–5
bounded 255–6
contingency theory 126–7, 129
critical-rationalist policy analysis 175–7
ecological 71
erotetic 25
hierarchists 101
individualists 112
instrumental 174
instrumental to fallibilist-pragmatist
171–3, 247
leadership 124–5
of power 87
social 71–2
Ravetz, J.R. 172–3
Rawls, John 205–6
Rayner, Steve 95
received culture 92–4
redistributive policies 62
reflexivity 5–6, 21n, 260
pragmatic reflexive policy analysis 184–94
300
regulative policies 62
Rein, M. 162, 181
reinventing government 38
relativism 178–9, 182, 183
research and analyse 185
responsibility 7
responsive governance 23–30
Rhodes, R.A.W. 10
Ricoeur, Paul 7
Rip, A. 170
Rittel, H.W.J. 8–9, 73, 78
Roberts, N.C. 164
Rochefort, D.A. 61, 93–4
Rooney, D. 251
Rosanvallon, Pierre 12, 14, 42, 195
Ross, M.H. 93–4
Rotterdam 26, 233, 239
rule 142, 152, 162, 246, 248, 249
ruler-ruled dichotomy 39–40
S
Sabatier, P. 133, 138
sacred model 48–9
Safranski, R. 87–8n
Saretzki, Thomas 253–4, 257
satisficing 125
Scharpf, Fritz 130
Schattschneider, E.E. 3, 28, 39, 61, 67, 100
Scheffer, P. 108
Schiphol Airport 92, 110, 233, 239
Schmutzer, M.A.E. 97, 107, 118, 120n
Schneider, A.L. 32–3, 64, 65
Schön, Don 118, 119n, 162, 181, 182
Schudson, M. 240n
Schumpeter, Joseph 28, 165, 174, 196, 199
Schwarz, M. 181
science
disenchantment 171
fairness approach to problem solving 205
and politics 169–70, 174
postnormal 172–3
science-politics interaction 132
Science Technology and Society (STS) 169
scientific knowledge 54–5, 167
Scientific Value Relativism 119n
scientists
closed policy networks 131–3
open policy networks 135
Scott, W.R. 130
Sederberg, Peter 7, 167
self-regulatory society 11–13
Selle, P. 94
Seltzer, R. 104
Shapin, S. 107
Shore, C. 51
Index
Simon, Herbert 71, 78, 81, 101, 123, 124,
125, 126
sin policy 74–5
Sivan, E. 97
Skocpol, T. 64
Smith, K.B. 63
smoking 103–4
Snow, John 114
social construction 49–50
issue typologies 65–6
politics of meaning 59–61
problems 66–70
social rationality 71–2
social-relational context 54
socio-political contexts 243
Socrates 24
soil pollution 150–3, 163, 164, 197
solidarities see ways of life
solutions, see also problem-solution
couplings
speaking truth to power 123, 167, 168–70
spectator/actor split 235–6
Stacey, R.D. 128, 129
stages and cycle model 46, 47
standing influence 249
Stanley, J.C. 175–6
state 1
fairness approach to problem solving 204
penetration of life-worlds 10–11
sovereignty 13–14
welfarism 13
Steinberger, P.J. 64, 65, 69
Steinbrunner, J.D. 123
Stirling, A. 193
Stolle, D. 41
Streeck, W. 222
structured problems 72–3
AIDS 80
closed policy networks 246
and democracy 211, 212
enclavists 111
hierarchists 103–4, 116
individualists 114
isolates 107
participation 226–7, 249
and political theories 211, 212, 248
problem-structuring trajectories 162
properties 76–9
rule approach 248
styles of policy analysis 194
and Thompson and Tuden typology 128
Volgermeer Polder 150–3
Wadden Sea 158–9
suasion 64–5
supermarket state 38
Suskind, Ron 89n, 255
Sweden 84, 85
Switzerland
drugs policy 154–7, 163, 164, 197–8
referenda 240–1n
symbolic reassurance 136
synthetic learning 136
T
technical approach to problem solving
basic theoretical claims 198–9
and democracy in practice 199–200
and fairness approach 204
problem types and political theories
211–12
technocracy 132, 198, 260
Tetlock, Philip E. 71–2
Thelen, K. 222
Thompson, Michael 95, 96, 97, 98, 99, 112,
118, 181, 221
Thompson, T.J. 88n, 123, 127–9, 130, 143n
tinkering 165, 181, 196, 212, 219
Torgerson, D. 180–1
translation dynamics 52–3, 244
Trechsel, A.H. 224, 240–1n
Tuden, A. 88n, 123, 127–9, 130, 143n
Turnbull, Nick 5, 24, 27
Type III errors see wrong-problem problems
U
UK
AIDS 83, 84
Modernising government 3, 26
unity-in-disharmony 8–9, 244
unstable casino 105–6
unstructured problems 73–4, 88n
and democracy 211, 212
hierarchists 104–5
individualists 114
isolates 107–9, 116
learning approach 249
meta-governance 249–50
open policy networks 247
participation 226, 228–9, 250
and political theories 211, 212, 248
prenatal screening 146–7
problem-structuring trajectories 162
properties 76–9
styles of policy analysis 194
and Thompson and Tuden typology 128
translation dynamics 245
Wadden Sea 159
US
AIDS 82
collaborative forums 230–1
conservative world view 118n
301
The governance of problems
Equal Rights Amendment 143–4n
government 39
gun control 93, 104, 108–9, 114, 141,
143n
Iraq war 5
methodological congruence 129–30
morality policy 74
Office of Technology Assessment 230–1
open policy networks 134, 135
order 119n
smoking 103–4
zero emission target 105
V
values 66–7
fact-value distinction 68–70
Van Eeten, M. 110–11
Van Stokkom, B. 230
venue shopping 164
Vergragt, P.J. 79
Vizzard, William J. 108–9
Volgermeer Polder 150–3, 163, 164, 197
W
Wadden Sea 158–62, 163, 164, 166n, 197
Wagner, P. 34
Wälti, S. 155, 157
Warin, P. 231–2
ways of life 100, 118n
enclavists 109–12
hierarchists 100–5
individualists 112–15
isolates 105–9
Webber, M.D. 8–9, 73, 78
Weingart, Peter 169
Weiss, C.H. 177–8
welfare state 33–5
well-structuredness 88n
Wevers, Kees 158
wicked problems 8–9, 15, 73, 88n
participation 227–8
Wildavsky, Aaron 51, 56–7, 95, 97, 112,
123, 124, 167, 178, 179, 251
Wilke, H.A.M. 213n
Williamson, A. 230–1
Wilson, J.Q. 62–3, 64
Wright, S. 51
Wrong, D. 252
wrong-problem problems 86–7, 249
primacy of problems in healthcare
217–20
Y
Yanow, D. 61
302
“Hoppe has long been an important contributor to the field of public policy.
Most important, his work has always challenged the conventional wisdom in
ways that have led to useful insights for both theorists and practitioners. In this
book, he analyses basic issues related to problem definition and participation.
Both problem identification and problem solving, he shows, can be reflexive and
yet pragmatic at the same time.”
Frank Fischer, Professor of Political Science and Global Affairs,
Rutgers University, USA
Policy analysis usually gives more attention to problem solving than problem finding and
there is a real threat of mismatch between problem perceptions by citizens and problem
definition by their elected and appointed policy makers. Contemporary democracies need to
develop a better governance of problems, as all too often, policy is a sophisticated answer to
the wrong problem.
This book offers a compelling new approach to public policy making as problem processing
– problem finding, problem framing, problem structuring, problem definition and problem
solving. It brings together aspects of puzzling, powering and participation, relating them
in interesting and different ways to cultural theory, to issues about networks, to models
of democracy and to modes of citizen participation. The author pays serious attention to
creating the institutional conditions for more reflexive, deliberative practices of problem
structuring in governance structures.
The book, which is part of a growing body of work in policy analysis literature, is clearly
written and accessibly presented. Key points are lucidly set out and well illustrated with
examples, making this an ideal text for academics and postgraduate students.
Robert Hoppe is Professor of Policy and Knowledge in the Faculty of Management and Governance at Twente
University, the Netherlands. His publications concern the methodological and institutional implications of
deliberative policy analysis, the governance of expertise and long-term policy dynamics and innovation, especially the
role of technology.
public policy / GOVERNANCE
ISBN 978-1-84742-629-1
www.policypress.co.uk
BH032_Hoppe_PPC_3.1.indd 1
9 781847 426291
THE GOVERNANCE OF PROBLEMS • Robert Hoppe
“Hoppe subtly explores the problems inherent in traditional rational policy
analysis which claims to be able to speak ‘truth to power’, exploring the
relationship between problem solving (‘puzzling’) and securing a real impact
(‘powering’). It is an important contribution to policy analysis.”
Michael J. Hill, Emeritus Professor of Newcastle University and Visiting Professor
at the University of Brighton and Queen Mary College, University of London
the GOVERNANCE
of PROBLEMS
puzzling, powering and
participation
Robert Hoppe
01/04/2010 12:28:26